Extreme weather + Climate Change

Discussion on living for a better and more responsible future
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lancashire lass
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Extreme weather + Climate Change

Post by lancashire lass »

So, it's official - climate change is already here.

Have to say that the weather events around the world this past couple of months has been phenomenal. The record breaking temperatures in the north west of America and Canada, Russian arctic, wildfires that followed, the Biblical floods in Europe (the photos taken of the massive erosion are almost unbelievable), not to mention the floods in India and China .... and many more still happening, even theLondon floods albeit on a smaller scale. And they say this is only the beginning and things will get a lot worse.

And while there's a desperate need to reduce carbon emissions, seems everyone are keen to "get back to normal" after the pandemic which is strangely at odds to tackling the problem. What happened to some of the suggestions during the first lockdown when the roads and skies were clear of traffic and the noise and air pollution was low? I don't live near the East Midlands airport but do hear planes circling as they move into land - after several months of no traffic, lately it seems to be back to normal. Difficult to say about the roads as I have been going in to work much earlier than normal (for a couple of hours) as part of the Covid risk assessment to reduce numbers at any one time.

But the idea of allowing flexible homeworking for those who can seems to be getting dismissed in favour of bringing office workers back into the towns and cities for fear of local businesses relying on their custom from collapsing. Rather than think the problem through with alternatives for greener options, the answer is not to deal with it and go back to the same old thing. Not a lot of progress happening there then?

Personally, I liked working from home with the odd visit to work had worked well for me but the tone is rapidly changing with encouragement to get everyone back to the work place. And to add insult, the price of fuel for the car has shot up so getting to and from work will start costing a lot more. And the Workplace Parking Levy will start up again, so even more expense. So much for trying to be green ...
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Mo
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Re: Extreme weather + Climate Change

Post by Mo »

The workplace parking levy IS green.
Well, it's 'let's pretend to be green'. Just like the bedroom tax was about releasing big houses for people who need them.
Neither any good unless there were alternatives in place - home working & public transport, smaller houses.
The other pretence was giving councils grants for active travel that had to be spent in a hurry so cycle lanes were put in that were either badly designed or not properly sold to car drivers, and now are being taken out again. What a waste.

Did you really expect anything different though.
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lancashire lass
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Re: Extreme weather + Climate Change

Post by lancashire lass »

Climate change is being referred to even more often with the ongoing wildfires ranging in southern European countries and California.

Another news item this week was the weakening of the thermohaline circulation which may be attributed to global warming over the past 200 years. As the Gulf Stream is responsible for the "warmer" winters in western Europe, the shut down could mean bitterly cold winters experienced by most other northern hemisphere countries. The "Beast from the East" in the UK could become a regular feature.
Mo wrote: 30 Jul 2021, 10:01 The workplace parking levy IS green
I'm not against the WPL if it applied to just going into the city when there is perfectly good public transport (all trams and buses go to the city) but when the city boundary extends out and includes districts that your particular mode of transport doesn't go near, you end up having to go into the city (and possibly walking from one end of the city to the other end because the buses don't go to a central hub) and then find transport to come back out - along with crowded buses (before Covid) which drove right past your bus stop, missing your connection and then boarding yet another crowded bus (standing room only), it is the most unpleasant journey which can take up to 2 hours from your doorstep to work, and another 2 hours coming home. Even with one of the bridges partially closed for urgent repairs (since February 2019), my alternate route by car via the M1 only takes 30-40 minutes.
Mo wrote: 30 Jul 2021, 10:01 The other pretence was giving councils grants for active travel that had to be spent in a hurry so cycle lanes were put in that were either badly designed or not properly sold to car drivers, and now are being taken out again. What a waste.
There was an article on one of the tv news channels about the road system in the Netherlands which give the cyclist (and pedestrian) priority, and how this is now being adapted in the Highway code. It sounds a nice idea but as usual, there is no real thought about design and you can't just copy a system and overlay it onto the current one hoping it will fit. In the UK, people used to live crowded in poor housing near their place of work which were in walking or cycling distance (and the wealthier people lived in the suburbs or further where they could travel by train or other transport) With housing more and more spread out, collapse of industry and the decline in public transport services, the distance between home and place of work is much further now and driving to work became the norm.

When I was younger, I used to cycle from one town to the other (at the time I was trying to save as much money as possible) but after a harrowing experience when a lorry driving at 50 mph drove past and gave me less than 2 feet clearance, it put me off (there was an alternate route but it was 3 times the distance and I had to go up and down hills). When I moved to Nottingham, I used to walk the 2 mile to work (and caught the bus home) but breathing in the pollution from all the traffic has impacted my health. The point I'm making is that slapping a white line on the road to mark out a cycle lane is more about complying with the idea of providing alternate "green" ways to get about than actually thinking about it properly.
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Mo
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Re: Extreme weather + Climate Change

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lancashire lass wrote: 07 Aug 2021, 17:33 The point I'm making is that slapping a white line on the road to mark out a cycle lane is more about complying with the idea of providing alternate "green" ways to get about than actually thinking about it properly.
Exactly. What is needed is long term thinking. What we get is headline grabbing.
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Meanqueen
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Re: Extreme weather + Climate Change

Post by Meanqueen »

Extreme weather and climate change has been around for a long time. The Government have tried various patches to cover the cracks which has usually fizzled out after people got bored with them. People don't want to ride their bikes in winter, arriving at work with frostbite and having to keep a spare set of clothes in a locker.

Expect to see a lot more shock horror videos and news reports of floods, fires, and hurricanes. This new crisis will follow on seamlessly from the plandemic, which was seen as a window of opportunity by Klaus S and his band of merry men at the WEF. Scare the (banned word) out of them and they will do anything.

Yes, things are not looking so good, we are having extremes of weather, and something ought to be done, a solution needs to be found. But while the rich keep on getting richer, and the poor at the bottom of the pile are expected to make sacrifices, nothing will be solved.

The very people who created the problem are those with the most money. They are not going to stop jetting around the world, launching themselves into space, and buying up mega acres (hectares) of land to alter the way we farm food. Gates solution is for everyone to stop eating meat because cows fart.

The billionaires are calling the shots, they think they are God. The unsettled climate is their doing, they created it with their greed. I am switching off from this latest round of scaremongering, which by the way is not going to end, and I'm getting on with my own life.

Best wishes. ilona
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Mo
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Re: Extreme weather + Climate Change

Post by Mo »

Meanqueen wrote: 10 Aug 2021, 11:10 . But while the rich keep on getting richer, and the poor at the bottom of the pile are expected to make sacrifices, nothing will be solved.

The very people who created the problem are those with the most money. They are not going to stop jetting around the world, launching themselves into space, and buying up mega acres (hectares) of land to alter the way we farm food.
Best wishes. ilona
YEs
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lancashire lass
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Re: Extreme weather + Climate Change

Post by lancashire lass »

Images of the destructive Hurricane Ida in the USA seems to have shown the same intense rainfall as experienced elsewhere this year (scenes of flooding in the subway in New York is very reminiscent of the one in China) At the moment it seems unlikely the now downgraded storm will reach the UK due to the current high pressure system hovering over the country causing the cool cloudy conditions. However, I think it likely we can expect our autumn and winter weather to generally get more wet with increased chance of flooding and higher risk of gale and storm force winds.
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