1st Coal free day in the UK ; since the industrial revolution

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Plutonium Belt
@plutonium
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Fuck you coal slurry belongs in the river systems.
 
The world moves forward as we move backward. so much winning.
 
The world moves forward as we move backward. so much winning.
You shut yer whore mouth. MAGA !! MAGA!! MAGA!!

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On a serious note, the government (local and federal) along with business interests should have provided free retraining to Coal miners / workers to get jobs in other industries. Toyota is doing this to its workers in the plant it is shutting down in Australia.
 
According to wiki, in 2014 the UK generated 29% of its power from coal

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_the_United_Kingdom#Electricity_supply

Curious how they made up for all that in just a few years, assuming the numbers are correct.

edit: nvm I see that it isn't that they are shutting down coal, it's just that they are have a coal free day. Not really sure the ramifications of that.
They are increasingly relying on renewables and natural gas, and trying to wean themselves off coal. Germany is way ahead in this regard.
 
The world moves forward as we move backward. so much winning.

As renewable energy becomes cheaper coal will go away. The market does a perfect job of fixing the problem.

Here in California solar is causing all sorts of neat side effects. Small hydro is going away. PG&E is scaling back lots of things because more and more solar is decreasing the load and demand.

I plan on going solar soon. The prices are falling and the products are better than ever.
 
There was this one time that a weather event (some kind of pressure or temperature inversion iirc) concentrated all the London area pollution above the city for several days and thousands of people died.
#history-ish
 
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As renewable energy becomes cheaper coal will go away. The market does a perfect job of fixing the problem.

Here in California solar is causing all sorts of neat side effects. Small hydro is going away. PG&E is scaling back lots of things because more and more solar is decreasing the load and demand.

I plan on going solar soon. The prices are falling and the products are better than ever.

Well...

" Wyoming - Republican group trying to ban Wind & Solar energy companies selling to locals "

http://forums.sherdog.com/threads/w...r-energy-companies-selling-to-locals.3452305/
 
As renewable energy becomes cheaper coal will go away. The market does a perfect job of fixing the problem.

Here in California solar is causing all sorts of neat side effects. Small hydro is going away. PG&E is scaling back lots of things because more and more solar is decreasing the load and demand.

I plan on going solar soon. The prices are falling and the products are better than ever.

I agree. It's just a shame we have a president making policies that push a dying industry instead of investing in the future and actual growth of renewable energy.
 
There was a thread a little while ago on how China is becoming the leader in producing green technologies. Solar panels, wind turbines, water turbines, etc. This makes me sad. I have been talking about trying to ramp up our green tech production for years, and now, the Chinese are beating us to the punch because they realize that fossil fuels are the past. Whether or not you believe in climate change, it is 100% proven that we will run out of fossil fuels. Why are we continuing to rely on them when we could be producing the technology that will replace them? How is that not a good economic decision? By kicking the can down the road and continuing to rely on coal and gas, we are losing our competitive advantage. It is seriously the stupidest decision that we can make, and I am ashamed of this short-sighted approach from my fellow conservatives. Green energy should be for everyone, and we need to get on our damn game. It is ridiculous that we are doing what we are doing.
 
Fuck you coal slurry belongs in the river systems.
Li%E2%80%99l-Lisas-Patented-Animal-Slurry-Screenshot-2.png

"A spoonful of slurry will cure what ails you."
 
There was a thread a little while ago on how China is becoming the leader in producing green technologies. Solar panels, wind turbines, water turbines, etc. This makes me sad. I have been talking about trying to ramp up our green tech production for years, and now, the Chinese are beating us to the punch because they realize that fossil fuels are the past. Whether or not you believe in climate change, it is 100% proven that we will run out of fossil fuels. Why are we continuing to rely on them when we could be producing the technology that will replace them? How is that not a good economic decision? By kicking the can down the road and continuing to rely on coal and gas, we are losing our competitive advantage. It is seriously the stupidest decision that we can make, and I am ashamed of this short-sighted approach from my fellow conservatives. Green energy should be for everyone, and we need to get on our damn game. It is ridiculous that we are doing what we are doing.
Corporate cultures insatiable lust for short term profit gain is the culprit. We haven't been in the long term outlook game for quite awhile in the US. It's the same reason we don't have a real railroad infrastructure or high speed rail.
 
Corporate cultures insatiable lust for short term profit gain is the culprit. We haven't been in the long term outlook game for quite awhile in the US. It's the same reason we don't have a real railroad infrastructure or high speed rail.
So this is going onto a different topic, but how do you plan to stop "corporate culture's insatiable lust for short-term profit gain?" It's a serious question. It's really easy to bitch about, and I totally understand the frustration, but we are what we incentivize.

I, for one, have no interest in slowing economic growth or anything. I have some practical measures that I think would help the situation. First, we need to implement a carbon tax right away. I want to lower corporate taxes across the board to establish a lower baseline to incentivize business development in this country (so that companies don't move to other places where there are less regulations and lower resulting costs), and then slap on a carbon tax. For every ton of carbon that you produce from your smokestacks, you will be charged a fee. When done in unison, you will see a major transference of the tax burden to companies that produce more carbon. I'd also like to expand the tax breaks for companies that transition over to green technologies, allowing the government to help absorb the costs associated with that transition. These things should solve most of the problem right away.

I'd also like to create tax incentives and possibly grants for companies who develop/produce new sustainable energy technologies. America's economy has always been relatively dependent on our exports, unlike many of the Nordic countries that are so often admired on these boards. I think that our American combination of innovation, technology, and production capabilities could launch us into a leadership position for the creation of green tech. I can easily imagine us out-producing China because we can produce higher quality, more efficient tech than they can. We can help other countries reduce their dependency on fossil fuels more effectively, which is good for our economy and the planet simultaneously. I think we can use capitalism to solve this problem, not view it as an obstacle to it.

Anything that runs contrary to using existing characteristics to our advantage is likely just wishful thinking. You won't create a situation where companies seek to raise their own costs, reduce profits, or seek out their competition so that they could help them. We have to think more pragmatically than that.
 
I agree largely with what you said. I'm not sure if a carbon tax is the right way, but it makes some sense. I would definitely use the government to shift our priorities. Obviously companies will not budge on their own. I'd like to see us spend a few trillion dollars on renewable energy R&D and infrastructure instead of blowing up the ME to protect oil interests.
@sub_thug
 
I agree largely with what you said. I'm not sure if a carbon tax is the right way, but it makes some sense. I would definitely use the government to shift our priorities. Obviously companies will not budge on their own. I'd like to see us spend a few trillion dollars on renewable energy R&D and infrastructure instead of blowing up the ME to protect oil interests.
@sub_thug
I like the carbon tax because it's easier to implement and it lets the market drive the change, and that normally works much better than the government trying to force change.

It's a shift, but I actually kind of wish that we had been protecting oil interests in the Middle East. Had we been doing that, there would have been a clear reason to be in Iraq or Afghanistan after Bin Laden was killed. But the French got the biggest contracts in Iraq during the reconstruction, oil prices didn't go down, and the proof just isn't there that it was all about oil. Oil being in the region definitely enhances the strategic importance of the region, but that's not the only thing that makes it important. As such, I don't think that we are getting out of the region any time soon. With that in mind, I have a hard time seeing tons of federal funding getting out of military expenditures and getting into green tech. I think we will have to rely on the private sector here, so I'm hoping that the government creates the environment for that to happen. Just my take.
 
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