Climate Crisis, Biosphere & Societal Collapse
A place to share news, experiences and discussion about the continuing climate crisis, societal collapse, and biosphere collapse. Please be respectful of each other and remember the human.
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Useful Links:
Earth - A Global Map of Wind, Weather and Ocean Conditions - Use the menu at bottom left to toggle different views. For example, you can see where wildfires/smoke are by selecting "Chem - COsc" to see carbon monoxide (CO) surface concentration.
Climate Reanalyzer (University of Maine) - A source for daily updated average global air temps, sea surface temps, sea ice, weather and more.
National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center (US) - Information about ENSO and weather predictions.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) Global Temperature Rankings Outlook (US) - Tool that is updated each month, concurrent with the release of the monthly global climate report.
Canadian Wildland Fire Information System - Government of Canada
Surging Seas Risk Zone Map - For discovering which areas could be underwater soon.
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Problem is, in western countries especially, tbh, our quality of life hasn't been hit all that hard. Unlike iran, where they are running out of water partly (not entirely, mismanagement is a problem there) to climate change.
I think when there's a very real danger many will go hungry due to idk, a 10 year drought (likely to happen in my country, Australia). Then, even the conservatives will no longer deny climate change. Indeed, I think it will be the centre of their agenda just like everyone else's. Combined this with their facist streak, the pessimist in me thinks that moment will not be pretty.
The optimist in me says that there has been signifcant work towards net zero. We're lucky enough we've invented the solutions (solar panels). South Australia for example is targetting 100% by the near 2027 (currently 70% according to wikipedia).
Bit of a short essay but there you go, thats my opinion
France just passed that line. In the wake of the (multiple) historical heat waves France has sustained these past months, the far-right party "Rassemblement National" now claims "the government has not listened to the scientists!", while they used to denigrate the very scientists they talk about.
But it doesn't mean they intend to listen now either. While scientists talk about adaptation and the urgency to get out of fossil, the party just proposes a massive subsidy to install aircons everywhere. Scientists have explicitely warned against that approach.
Nothing about the agriculture (let big agro industry figure it out, so it will be megabasin for a few to hoard water, unlimited pesticids, etc.), nothing about wild life, nothing about people who will need to go outside if aircons heated up further city centers, nothing about power generation while some nuclear power plants had to limit their output or even shutdown by lack of cooling water, etc.
They plan to keep not listening.
Is Australia making solar panels or buying from China?
Australia is actually still making solar panels, quite good ones actually
(nowhere near as cheap as China, but less transport costs...)
https://tindosolar.com.au/our-product/tindo-panels/
Everyone is buying from China. Nobody has the resources and cheap enough labour and fiscal policies that control labour wages and export costs to keep the panels as cheap as what China can make. It's their century now.
Thing is, does it matter? Once they're made they'll be used for the next 20 years, it's not like the stock needs constant replenishment because it can be used precisely once like LNG.
China has been selling solar panels at a loss because they wanted to scale their industry. They actually sell them below cost and subsidize the production.
The second big reason that they are cheaper is that they use coal and pollute more in the manufacturing process. If they produced panels with as little pollution as a western manufacturing company, the cost would be 10X higher.
In these huge solar panel plants, less than 1% of the current power inputs into the process is rewable, and there are no plans to make it renewable for at least the next 40 years... As in, all these long range power infrastructure investments in China are in coal and fossil fuels for this manufacturing sector.
I've got a pet conspiracy theory.
China is worried about global warming. They realised there was only so much they could do themselves. They also realised the rest of the world is just going to bury its heads in the sand.
How can China combat global warming most efficiently? By dumping huge numbers of solar panels (and support equipment) onto the market at cost or below cost.
They don't need to persuade foreign politicians, they just need to let the people under them attack the problem.
It's simultaneously a very capitalistic, and communistic solution. Which seems to fit China's mentality.
There are some headlines about how China was expecting constant growth of solar panel sales, and they went all out trying to build this future capacity so that they would be able to corner the market...
But they overestimated the speed of the sales growth and built way more manufacturing capacity than the amount the world wants to buy, meaning the whole system is wildly beyond the needed capacity.
This comes down to China not having enough oil, and thus not enough energy. Their domestic oil is only a drop in the buckef of what they need. So they go ham on everything else, demand side and supply side. To lower demand they build subways and trains like crazy. To increase energy supply they build hydro, nuclear, and now solar. Solar is now cheap because they had to focus on it.
Fully agreed.
They also seemed to realise they can make far more panels than they can deploy. It doesn't matter where the oil is displaced, so long as it goes down, so will prices.
It's now a profitable export that the world really needs. But there's no grand plan, it's just that China needed a way out of their own energy constraint.
While China is cheap that doesn't preclude other countries from doing things.