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Letter: Carbon plan is pure fiction
Tuesday 18th August 2009, 8:00AM BST.
Letter: Ever since cinema was invented there have been science fiction “catastrophe” movies of varying quality and credibility.
I could think of an idea for a silly sci-fi film. Let’s pretend that planet Earth’s crustal tectonic plates started shifting and suddenly the whole of the British Isles disappeared with total loss of everything associated with the UK.
That’s silly fiction. However, if it happened, the UK contribution to global carbon emissions, at just under two per cent, would not be missed at all, and there would be no effect on climate change abatement.
Let’s imagine another totally silly fictional event – that the UK alone in the globe was hit by such an unprecedented economic crisis that all electrical power production ceased.
The UK power stations contribute one third of our carbon emissions. So if we ceased absolutely to use all our UK power stations the UK contribution to global carbon emissions would drop from two per cent to 1.2 per cent.
That would not make one iota of difference to global climate change abatement.
Now let’s consider true facts that are stranger than fiction: Our government ministers Ed Miliband MP at Westminster and Jane Davidson AM at Cardiff, want to cover our entire nation with wind turbines to save the planet from global climate change.
This is going to cost the general public billions of pounds sterling and put up our energy bills to an enormous cost for an intermittent and unreliable source of power in our national grid.
It is most probable that their mad scheme will never replace more than a fifth of our power stations’ contribution to global carbon emissions or a fifth of 1.2 per cent.
You couldn’t think up a better fictional theme for a sci-fi disaster film if you tried. I’m off to the cinema before the lights go out.
Ioan Richard
Swansea
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Perhaps when Ironbridge power station is decomissioned it could be replaced with a nuclear power station. NIMBY anyone?
I see the future as an increase in community based power generation. That is a community comes together and owns/builds a source of power generation (lets say biomass). With no middleman making a profit and no reliance on foreign fuel sources it would be much cheaper. It could be used to create electricity and heat homes at the same time. They are all the rage in denmark and germany.
There are some examples in this country already with some new housing developments installing microgeneration rather than paying large amounts of money to hook up to the gas network.
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I went to Sellafield and apparently the nucleur waste if my life-times energy consumption was 100% from nucleur would be as big as my fist. Sounds ok to me.
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I’d be quite happy with Ironbridge becoming a nuclear power station and I live with a couple of miles of it. Nuclear energy is clean and green and over a 20 year lifetime produces about a bucket full of high level radioactive waste. The French have nuclear power stations all over the place and there aren’t too many 3 headed Frenchmen about.
Unfortunately there are still too many Ludites in this country who believe scaremongering stories from red topped newspapers and the television instead of investigating things for themselves.
The modern Finnish nuclear power plants operate at 94% capacity, a typical wind turbine operates at 30% capacity. The UK currently has 3000 megawatts of wind generating capacity, at 30% capacity that means 1000 megawatts of electricty is being generated – equivalent to one of our nuclear power stations.
That means to replace all of our currently operating nuclear plants with wind power we would need 10 times the current number of turbines. Thats 30,000 wind turbines, now which would you rather have spoiling your veiw, one small industrial complex or several hundred white propellers whirring away?
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We visited a housing association complex last year on the heritage W/E in Craven Arms. A happy tenant told us that they had had radiators fitted when they were built but in the 2 years they had been living there, they had never had to use them.
We have a very large number of new developments in Shrewsbury at present. None of the ones I have seen are of this standard, nor are they well designed aesthetically or as very good places to live in.
For example: poor provision of internal space, poor provision of outdoor space, internal bathrooms with no windows or only a rooflight, bedrooms with only windows too high to look out of and or space limited by sloping ceilings.
Dark internal corridors and the need for later extraneous fixtures on the exterior which could have been designed into the build like aerials and satalite dishes.
No sustainable elements such as thermal rods or green rooves have been incorporated into these substantial developments.
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why is shropshire star publishing this letter from Swansea, the author has clearly send it to every paper in the country as part of an industry funded campaign to undermine the science which tells us climate change is a problem
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I spend a lot of time driving around mid-wales and one thing that is very noticable is that a lot of the time the wind turbines are not turning. Now correct me if I am wrong but if the blades are still then they aren’t generating any power.
In my opinion they are a giant con!
The money would be far better spent on energy conservation
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Ioan Richard’s silly sci-fi film makes me think of this John Donne poem;
No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manner of thine own
Or of thine friend’s were.
Each man’s death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.
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Ioan from Swansea, sod it, let’s not bother developing the technology that we can then sell on to the big polluting countries. I mean, who in their right mind is going to be interested in investing in green electricity?
I agree with the first comment above, a lot more energy generation will take place at a smaller scale, but for those technologies to be available, at an affordable price, investment has to be made on a larger scale. So ironically, moaning that wind turbines are pointless, is pointless.
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who cartes what some one from swansea thinks about the shropshire scenary, these people are professional letter writers funded by the oil industry to undermine new technologies
wake up to reality mr swansea man, people in shropshrie want to go green, we live off the main gas supply so we want cheap clean power like wind turbines home produced in Shropshire where we can get green collar jobs and use it locally efficiently
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SW – you are falling into the trap that most climate change nuts would have you believe. The climate has been getting warmer but no significant rise has occured since the early 90′s. The same scare mongers would have us believe that co2 is to blame. Co2 is a so called ‘greenhouse gas’ but not a very good one. Water vapour is a seriously efficient greenhouse in stark contrast. Co2 emissions by man are dwarfed by that released from the sea. In fact, 1 errupting volcano produces more Co2 than 30 times the worlds output in a year!
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Very interesting point Brimondo, research shows that tempretures peaked in 1998, however CO2 has continued to rise, so therefore there is no correlation between tempretures and CO2.
Just what don’t these greenies understand about that?
Anyway I burn 100% scrap wood to heat my home so I’m keeping the greenies happy.
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Lucy W, “research shows temperatures peaked in 1998″. Interesting, that completely goes against everything I have read. NASA data shows global temperatures continue to rise. What is your source?
Brimondo, “1 errupting volcano produces more Co2 than 30 times the worlds output in a year”. Utter rubbish. Where do you people get this? If that were true, there would be a massive spike in CO2 every time a volcano erupted, yet the CO2 in the atmosphere shows a very steady smooth increase.
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The Nasa chart does not show temperatures continue to rise but they peaked in 1998 and have fallen since then.
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Julian: Source is Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction.
I understand NASA had a few technical problems and have amended their findings. If I recall correctly the failed to factor in the fact the satellites monitoring global tempretures are constantly getting closer. If I recall correctly, NASA now has global tempretures falling.
Sadly the global warming doom-dayers cling on to the old stuff thats get regurgatated around the web by people who profit from all this nonsense, like Al Gore.
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Lucy W your lies cannot go unchallenged im sorry to side with nutters like Huw but actually there is a scientific consensus on the man main global warming issue – any one who does not agree with this is truely a NUTTER
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Ah Julian, I see they’ve got to you too! Poor misguided fool.
You are still looking for reactions from single events. The sky is a very big place and can take all the co2 a volcano can throw at it and still have no effect – just like it’s been doing for millions of years.
Why during the height of the industrial revolution and production increases in the early 1900′s, when there was more smoke, etc pumped into the atmosphere than ever before, did Co2 levels actually decline?
Humans shouldn’t flatter themselves that they are mightier than mother nature!
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this letter is pure fantasy
they are the kind of letter you can down load from an anti wind turbine website and send around the national media if you are into writing letters and doing that kind of thing like Ioan is
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it must be silly season, next they will be denying evolution
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Well, I managed to block out the pain of Lucy’s continued and in-no-way-utterly-tedious-and-boring rants against Al Gore by smacking my own brains out against my desk. However, it seems the relief was only temporary. Therefore, I think I’m going to have to take a chainsaw to my legs. Anything to make her stop…
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I’d recommend to anyone who seriously wants to examine the affects of climate change on us locally check out the Shropshire Local Climate Impact Profile which can be found on the council website.
Its a study of both past weather events and future predictions to give a better understanding of how we will be affected in the future.
Climate change is a reality, wether you believe that it is down to CO2 or aliens, and adaptation along with mitigation is the only sensible way forward.
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Thank you Ken for that, sorry I repeated what you said but comment was obviously awaiting moderation when I submitted mine. For a while I was starting to think I was a ‘nutter’.
Peter: Actually there isn’t a ‘consensus’. A recent survey of all papers on the subject of climate change that were published between 2004 and 2007 found that only 7 per cent explicitly endorsed a “so-called consensus” position that man-made carbon dioxide is causing catastrophic global warming.
Try a wider intake of reasearch papers before forming a view and name calling. Who’s the NUTTER now?
Mark: Please don’t cut your leg off with a chainsaw. They are 2-stoke engines which means their CO2 emmissions are terrible!
e: Just what do the council know about Climate Change? They can’t even empty the bins properly!! I suggest you get you hands on serious papers, such as one publish by the Hadley Centre (for Climate Prediction, not the day centre in Telford), which is a part of the Met Office.
For the rest of the fools: The last peak global temperatures were in 1998 and 1934 and the troughs of low temperature were around 1910 and 1970. The second dip caused pop science and the media to cry wolf about an impending, devastating Ice Age. Our end was nigh! Will you ever learn or do you thrive on hysteria?
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Lucy W, looks like NASA forgot to update their home page then, which still shows global temperatures rising steadily. I’m not saying you are wrong, but I cannot find this graph anywhere showing that temperatures have peaked.
Brimondo, CDIAC statistics show annual CO2 from volcanoes is about 200 million tonnes, while human’s burning and otherwise releasing fossil fuels contributes about 25 billion tonnes each year. So as you say, the atmosphere can cope with all the CO2 volcanoes can throw at it, but it will it be able to cope with all the CO2 us humans are now unlocking. Maybe it can. We’ll soon find out.
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julian: I can’t load nasa.com, it takes for ever, but are you catergorically saying that it says SINCE 1998 tempretures have been rising? or is it just a broad brush claim that since the 70′s tempretures have been rising?
Thing is, the greenies, go on and on about CO2 but never address the fact the cement creates its own weight in CO2 in production. One tonne of CO2 from cement is the equivalent of driving a car over 5000 miles. Why? Because they want to live in brick and mortar houses rather than prefabs. (I live in a prefab)
The 152m country’s homes cause 25m tonnes of CO2 to seep into the atmosphere every year. That’s considerably more than the UK’s cars emit.
I am yet to see those who actively target 4wd drivers rushing out to lecture the residents of Victorian homes bout the evils of draughty sash windows!
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Lucy W, try climate.nasa.gov I am not a climate scientist, I make no claims. However, I found your graph on the Hadley site. Air temperature over water has levelled off, you are correct, but over land it is still rising. Did you read Hadley’s caption for their graph?:
“Average global temperatures are now some 0.75 °C warmer than they were 100 years ago and since the mid-1970s average global temperatures have increased at a rate of more than 0.15 °C per decade. Yet over the last 10 years temperatures have risen more slowly, causing some to claim that global warming has stopped. Here we explain why this is not the case and explains that observed changes are entirely consistent with our understanding of natural fluctuations of the climate within a trend of continuing long-term warming. The evidence is very clear that global temperatures are rising and that humans are largely responsible.”
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The Global average temperature chart on the Nasa Global Climate Change web site does not show temperature continuing to rise, but instead shows the highest temperature as being 1998 all records since that year have been lower.
It is therefore untrue to claim Nasa shows global temperatures rising steadily.
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There is a general lack of acceptance or moving forward in this country regarding modern methods of construction Lucy. People associate prefabrication with post war emergency buildings not built to last when in reality they are practical long lasting and eco friendly in many regards.
We have had problems with concrete and asbestos which were being used in relatively new ways or abused for quick construction. (In the case of asbestos, of course, it was discovered to be a hazardous material) The Victorians were guilty of this ‘Gerry building’ too. Many of their houses were built shoddily but many were also well built but today need upgrading to be less energy consuming.
The Liver building in Liverpool is one of the first reinforced concrete buildings. The Victorians used it but in their view concrete was a pagan (It was invented by the Romans!) and unrestrained material and should there fore only ever be used covered up ( eg:with stone cladding) like provocative chair/table legs had to be hidden from sight !!!
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ioan know doubt works for the oil industry, they are the only people left on earth who deny climate change, its pretty much on par with creationism and denying the holocaust as socially unacceptable backward luddite behaviour and whilst i respect you opinion to be wrong i will not toleratethe peddling of lies like this, it must be exposed as the myth like the tooth fairy, we all know burning oil puts co2 into the air, carbon which had previously been locked away in the earths bank account for billions of years, if you spend all your savings you will be skint, period
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lucy W – that becuase its nasa . GOV not com, i have looked and guess what julian is right, you are WRONG, thats why you look like a nutter denying climate change because you dont know the FACTS and your not a scientist
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NASA’s website says
Since the late 1800′s, the global average temperature has increased about 0.7 to 1.4 degrees F (0.4 to 0.8 degrees C). Many experts estimate that the average temperature will rise an additional 2.5 to 10.4 degrees F (1.4 to 5.8 degrees C) by 2100.
and on the causes of this ?
The main human activities that contribute to global warming are the burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil, and natural gas) and the clearing of land.
I guess them Yankies in NASA are cranks right lucy? nutters who have a minority view, lefty greenies who hate travelling and using fuel .
Right ????????
Pardon what was that you said Lucy ????
Do i hear a sorry…..
Its OK, we all make mistakes, i am even wrong occassionally believe it or not :)
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what caused the last ice age wasn’t where we live now under ice? aren’t our oceans now over where land used to be? anyone else thought that the world warming up is just a natural event,who do we think we are? does anyone really think man can change mother nature? all this green tax is utter garbage, its the goverment jumping on an popular topic where have we seen that before? just another case of them taxing us to make up from the loss from smokers, beer drinkers and tax cheats and low and behold greenies are loving it, it really is so obvious.good job that our forefathers didn’t have their hands tied by do gooders and the pc brigade we’d still be stuck in caves!!!
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andy morris, yes ice ages are indeed natural cycles, but as to whether man can change mother nature, of course we can! be it on a small scale like cloud seeding to induce rain, or on a simply inconceivably massive scale like unlocking all the carbon, that were it not for man, would still be sitting in the ground.
Seriously, what part of it do you global warming deniers not understand? We are increasing CO2 levels. There is no argument about it. The arguments are about what will happen next.
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what’s P.C. about not wanting the planet to fry andy?
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Thank you Ken for saving me the bother of visiting Nasa.com
So I was right, max tempreture was 1998 – why can’t people read data? It makes them look so silly spouting off and interpreting vague generalisations to take on a meaning that suits their hysterical cause.
For example “Since the late 1800’s, the global average temperature has increased about 0.7 to 1.4 degrees” TRUE, its now 2009 and hotter than 1880, BUT its cooler than 1998!!!!! (and there is more CO2 in the atmosphere than 1998 so CO2 and Global tempretures are not linked!)
Another example “The main human activities that contribute to global warming are the burning of fossil fuels” TRUE, if you burn a lump of coal, it warms the atmosphere and that is man-made BUT its does not say that Global Warming is man made does it?
It takes a trained scientific mind to spot the ambiguity that confused the feeble minded.
As I said before, Nasa had a problem as they didn’t originally factor in the fact that the satelites they use are constantly getting closer to the earth. A huge embarsement and they are now using ambiguity to ease the pain but they do say that tempretures peaked in 1998.
If you don’t want to say sorry, please tell me the global tempreture for 1998 and 2007.
Its
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ha ha Lucy got it wrong!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! LOL
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its not PC to live in caves
there is nothing politically correct about saving energy its just common sense to save money and not destroy the planet we live on
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Oh dear Davey – you posted too soon! Obviously before Kens #25 and mine (#33).
Somebody pass Davey the humble pie please.
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