Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Use this board for general non-cycling-related chat, or to introduce yourself to the forum.
User avatar
simonineaston
Posts: 8003
Joined: 9 May 2007, 1:06pm
Location: ...at a cricket ground

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by simonineaston »

Well said, cugel, even if your tongue was in cheek. I was listening to a podcast y'day which made reference to the way that heresy in religion had been treated over the centuries and it's instructive to recall how things have changed a lot! It's tempting to think that modern ways are how things have been since forever - not so, it appears!
Last edited by simonineaston on 20 Jan 2023, 10:56am, edited 1 time in total.
S
(on the look out for Armageddon, on board a Brompton nano & ever-changing Moultons)
User avatar
Cugel
Posts: 5430
Joined: 13 Nov 2017, 11:14am

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by Cugel »

Ben@Forest wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 8:57am
irc wrote: 19 Jan 2023, 4:13pm Why? It's a holiday. If using zoom means no travel required perhaps we should all sit in our houses on zoom all the time?

Judging by the number of transatlantic flights plenty of people prefer real life to zoom.
The real question is why does Lucas fly to the States? If it is occasionally for environmental conferences or seminars that's different to a week at Disneyworld. Or, of course, she may have a child who has settled there or even have a grandchild there by now.

There's some old footage on a political programme of Polly Toynbee being skewered by Richard Littlejohn when he brings up the fact that she has a villa in Tuscany and flies there. Toynbee is floored by it, and it obviously made her think about what she said compared to what she did because somebody else brought it up a few years later and she simply and icily says 'I don't have a villa in Italy'.
Shaming is an old-fashioned and, these days, often ineffective way to persuade the most intransigent hypocrites (like me) to change their minds and ways. When I look back, there's no doubt that I've changed my own mind and antics far more in response to being shamed (by another or myself) than by lots of "studies", cod-logic or PR.

Cugel, guilty as sin.
“Practical men who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence are usually the slaves of some defunct economist”.
John Maynard Keynes
ANTONISH
Posts: 2967
Joined: 26 Mar 2009, 9:49am

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by ANTONISH »

simonineaston wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 10:55am Well said, cugel, even if your tongue was in cheek. I was listening to a podcast y'day which made reference to the way that heresy in religion had been treated over the centuries and it's instructive to recall how things have changed a lot!
Some religions have different views on heresy than others.
mattheus
Posts: 5044
Joined: 29 Dec 2008, 12:57pm
Location: Western Europe

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by mattheus »

Cugel wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 10:52am
mattheus wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 8:52am
irc wrote: 19 Jan 2023, 4:13pm
Why?
Exactly - why are you posting here? Do omnivores join discussions about vegetarian food to say
"I EAT MEAT! RAAARRGHH! "

Why is this thread so irresistible to you??
Don't put 'im (or 'er) off posting! I yam enjoying the thoughts expressed, in the same way one enjoys watching a-one o' them old horror films with lots of cardboard and makeup. ;-)

Cugel
:lol:

Fair point, I would not want to deprive you of entertainment. (although perhaps he will answer my little query, and that will entertain still further? )
Biospace
Posts: 2008
Joined: 24 Jun 2019, 12:23pm

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by Biospace »

Sweep wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 10:36am
Folks need to regain the idea that the journey is part of the trip/holiday/experience. (touring cyclists of course surely already know this) And enjoy it - it's definitely less stressful than shuffling forward pause shuffling pause repeat in an airport queue with occasional bending over to have your orifices probed.

Quite so. There are some very difficult conversations to be had regarding energy use. Should ability to pay permit anyone - no matter how 'important' - to fly repeatedly or otherwise use unlimited amounts of energy? What do we do if flying cars become 'practical' and costs come down to barely more than cars today? Even if we account for every externality and can show that with recycling and renewable energy the production and use of a flying car has no more carbon footprint than an electric bicycle, to what extent do we consider bird life?

As Pete75 points out, it's not climate change which is having most effect on life on Earth, it's our farming practices and other ways of living which have decimated so many species. If we study the carbon cycle we see that the natural one (vegetation, volcanoes etc) is around 5 times the size of the anthropogenic one. Clearly, our burning of fossil fuels is having an effect but it's how we use the land which very likely has a greater effect. Chopping down American native forests to fuel British demands for electricity is considered 'green' by governments, which is a great example of how we need to consider our actions a little more carefully.

To return to the original question, in general, the more we spend, the greater our carbon footprint. We do not have to place our money with global investment business, there are other ways. Perhaps the biggest hurdle is to overcome the psychology of consumption. I take much greater pleasure from allowing one high quality product to wear in rather than several cheaper ones wear out in the same time. Repairing something old should bring more satisfaction than unwrapping yet another Chinese-shiny new thing.

If people spent a day at a council 'tip' observing the new-ish items being discarded, the scale of the problem might lodge in more minds.
Ben@Forest
Posts: 3647
Joined: 28 Jan 2013, 5:58pm

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by Ben@Forest »

Biospace wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 2:34pmChopping down American native forests to fuel British demands for electricity is considered 'green' by governments, which is a great example of how we need to consider our actions a little more carefully.
Do you have actual evidence of the chopping down of whatever native forest is? I think primary forest might be a more used term? I do know there have been accusations of this which have been found to be absolutely baseless.

I do like talking to people about forestry... :wink:
Carlton green
Posts: 3645
Joined: 22 Jun 2019, 12:27pm

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by Carlton green »

Ben@Forest wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 6:43pm
Biospace wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 2:34pmChopping down American native forests to fuel British demands for electricity is considered 'green' by governments, which is a great example of how we need to consider our actions a little more carefully.
Do you have actual evidence of the chopping down of whatever native forest is? I think primary forest might be a more used term? I do know there have been accusations of this which have been found to be absolutely baseless.

I do like talking to people about forestry... :wink:
That’s an interesting angle. I would think that we are agreed that large amounts of Timber are felled in Canada, shipped across the Atlantic and burned here in the UK as biomass fuel. To me, and from an environmental stewardship perspective, that’s a questionable practice (maybe better than simply burning fossil fuel instead but should it really be considered green?).
Don’t fret, it’s OK to: ride a simple old bike; ride slowly, walk, rest and admire the view; ride off-road; ride in your raincoat; ride by yourself; ride in the dark; and ride one hundred yards or one hundred miles. Your bike and your choices to suit you.
User avatar
Cugel
Posts: 5430
Joined: 13 Nov 2017, 11:14am

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by Cugel »

Carlton green wrote: 21 Jan 2023, 8:33am
Ben@Forest wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 6:43pm
Biospace wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 2:34pmChopping down American native forests to fuel British demands for electricity is considered 'green' by governments, which is a great example of how we need to consider our actions a little more carefully.
Do you have actual evidence of the chopping down of whatever native forest is? I think primary forest might be a more used term? I do know there have been accusations of this which have been found to be absolutely baseless.

I do like talking to people about forestry... :wink:
That’s an interesting angle. I would think that we are agreed that large amounts of Timber are felled in Canada, shipped across the Atlantic and burned here in the UK as biomass fuel. To me, and from an environmental stewardship perspective, that’s a questionable practice (maybe better than simply burning fossil fuel instead but should it really be considered green?).
Wood burning has been labelled as "green because the chopped down & burnt tree can be replaced by a newly-planted one. However ....

There's a delay of some years before the newly-planted one eats as much carbon dioxide as the large mature one chopped down.
Burning wood produces not just CO2 but lots of other noxious gases and particulates.

In a steady state tree-population human community of small and scattered size, the case for woodburning is a good one, since the overall CO2-sucking tree level is at a constant and the smoke/gas produced is widely dissipated. When millions of trees are burnt with only some managed in a steady-state tree-population fashion, wood burning seems very "ungreen", especially if you live downwind of, or close to, a vast wood-burning power station.

Mr Forest will pick apart these assumptions if incorrect, I'm sure.

Cugel
“Practical men who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence are usually the slaves of some defunct economist”.
John Maynard Keynes
pwa
Posts: 17371
Joined: 2 Oct 2011, 8:55pm

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by pwa »

Cugel wrote: 21 Jan 2023, 10:01am
Carlton green wrote: 21 Jan 2023, 8:33am
Ben@Forest wrote: 20 Jan 2023, 6:43pm

Do you have actual evidence of the chopping down of whatever native forest is? I think primary forest might be a more used term? I do know there have been accusations of this which have been found to be absolutely baseless.

I do like talking to people about forestry... :wink:
That’s an interesting angle. I would think that we are agreed that large amounts of Timber are felled in Canada, shipped across the Atlantic and burned here in the UK as biomass fuel. To me, and from an environmental stewardship perspective, that’s a questionable practice (maybe better than simply burning fossil fuel instead but should it really be considered green?).
Wood burning has been labelled as "green because the chopped down & burnt tree can be replaced by a newly-planted one. However ....

There's a delay of some years before the newly-planted one eats as much carbon dioxide as the large mature one chopped down.
Burning wood produces not just CO2 but lots of other noxious gases and particulates.

In a steady state tree-population human community of small and scattered size, the case for woodburning is a good one, since the overall CO2-sucking tree level is at a constant and the smoke/gas produced is widely dissipated. When millions of trees are burnt with only some managed in a steady-state tree-population fashion, wood burning seems very "ungreen", especially if you live downwind of, or close to, a vast wood-burning power station.

Mr Forest will pick apart these assumptions if incorrect, I'm sure.

Cugel
Do you burn any wood, Cugel?
We do. In a rural setting. Our supplier says the timber comes from sustainable sources, which would mean from forestry run as a succession of crops. We have a lot of such forestry here on our doorstep, as you do. It was planted to be harvested. Harvested areas are re-planted. So there is a patchwork of blocks of forestry at different stages in the process. Taking carbon out of the atmosphere, then timber being burnt to release carbon. In theory, net low carbon. But we only have our supplier's word for it that our timber is indeed from local sustainable sources.

Burning some wood reduces the gas we burn. And the gas comes from a source that involves no carbon capture.
User avatar
Cugel
Posts: 5430
Joined: 13 Nov 2017, 11:14am

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by Cugel »

pwa wrote: 21 Jan 2023, 12:59pm
Do you burn any wood, Cugel?
We do. In a rural setting. Our supplier says the timber comes from sustainable sources, which would mean from forestry run as a succession of crops. We have a lot of such forestry here on our doorstep, as you do. It was planted to be harvested. Harvested areas are re-planted. So there is a patchwork of blocks of forestry at different stages in the process. Taking carbon out of the atmosphere, then timber being burnt to release carbon. In theory, net low carbon. But we only have our supplier's word for it that our timber is indeed from local sustainable sources.

Burning some wood reduces the gas we burn. And the gas comes from a source that involves no carbon capture.
No, we burn no wood despite the house having a vast wood burning stove installed by the bloke that designed the place and later sold it to us. We've lit the wood stove four times in the four years we've now lived here. Once to see if it worked; twice to show visitors just how hot the bluddy thing made the house (about 32 degrees C); once when the heat pump circuit board threw a wobbler and we had to wait a while to get a replacement board.

At present its chimney is stuffed with a thing to stop warm air wafting out of the house via the chimney's draught-suck. We're beginning to give away the various lumps of wood we collected for potential burning, to friends who have nothing but a wood burner to heat their hoose. That seems to be quite a lot of folk in West Wales, where most have no mains gas so rely on wood, propane bottles or oil.

We'd have our wood burner removed but the getting of it and it's chimney out would cost quite a bit; and I'm no longer up to crawling about in lofts and on the top of roofs with a spanner, crowbar, hammer et al myself.

************
Just lately the sun has been shining from dawn to dusk. The new solar panels that feed the batteries and the hoose have produced a surprising amount of e-juice for winter time. It bodes well for the longer days. :-) Back to cloudy tomorrow, though.

Cugel, snug & warm but still after a mini-windmill.
“Practical men who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence are usually the slaves of some defunct economist”.
John Maynard Keynes
pwa
Posts: 17371
Joined: 2 Oct 2011, 8:55pm

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by pwa »

Cugel wrote: 21 Jan 2023, 5:06pm
pwa wrote: 21 Jan 2023, 12:59pm
Do you burn any wood, Cugel?
We do. In a rural setting. Our supplier says the timber comes from sustainable sources, which would mean from forestry run as a succession of crops. We have a lot of such forestry here on our doorstep, as you do. It was planted to be harvested. Harvested areas are re-planted. So there is a patchwork of blocks of forestry at different stages in the process. Taking carbon out of the atmosphere, then timber being burnt to release carbon. In theory, net low carbon. But we only have our supplier's word for it that our timber is indeed from local sustainable sources.

Burning some wood reduces the gas we burn. And the gas comes from a source that involves no carbon capture.
No, we burn no wood despite the house having a vast wood burning stove installed by the bloke that designed the place and later sold it to us. We've lit the wood stove four times in the four years we've now lived here. Once to see if it worked; twice to show visitors just how hot the bluddy thing made the house (about 32 degrees C); once when the heat pump circuit board threw a wobbler and we had to wait a while to get a replacement board.

At present its chimney is stuffed with a thing to stop warm air wafting out of the house via the chimney's draught-suck. We're beginning to give away the various lumps of wood we collected for potential burning, to friends who have nothing but a wood burner to heat their hoose. That seems to be quite a lot of folk in West Wales, where most have no mains gas so rely on wood, propane bottles or oil.

We'd have our wood burner removed but the getting of it and it's chimney out would cost quite a bit; and I'm no longer up to crawling about in lofts and on the top of roofs with a spanner, crowbar, hammer et al myself.

************
Just lately the sun has been shining from dawn to dusk. The new solar panels that feed the batteries and the hoose have produced a surprising amount of e-juice for winter time. It bodes well for the longer days. :-) Back to cloudy tomorrow, though.

Cugel, snug & warm but still after a mini-windmill.
32 degrees would have me sitting outside to cool down! You could replace it the stove with the smaller one your home clearly ought to have had in the first place. It is good to have one even if only for the odd occasion when the electric fails for some reason.
Ben@Forest
Posts: 3647
Joined: 28 Jan 2013, 5:58pm

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by Ben@Forest »

Cugel wrote: 21 Jan 2023, 10:01am
Wood burning has been labelled as "green because the chopped down & burnt tree can be replaced by a newly-planted one. However ....

There's a delay of some years before the newly-planted one eats as much carbon dioxide as the large mature one chopped down.
Burning wood produces not just CO2 but lots of other noxious gases and particulates.

In a steady state tree-population human community of small and scattered size, the case for woodburning is a good one, since the overall CO2-sucking tree level is at a constant and the smoke/gas produced is widely dissipated. When millions of trees are burnt with only some managed in a steady-state tree-population fashion, wood burning seems very "ungreen", especially if you live downwind of, or close to, a vast wood-burning power station.

Mr Forest will pick apart these assumptions if incorrect, I'm sure.

Cugel
Burning wood produces CO2, but so does decaying wood. So burning it produces no more or less CO2 than wood in the natural carbon cycle. Of course it burns quicker than it grows but of course that's why short-rotation coppice, or short rotation forestry or burning 'life-expired' products has a market.

The idea that companies would deliberately try to source it from primary or old-growth forests shows no conception of forest economics. Why would a company do that when it wants an easily harvestable, uniform product which can be processed with the minimum of effort? Short-rotation forestry might be poplar harvested on a ten year rotation - on land that may never have been forest, or if it was was turned over to growing wheat or barley or beet 250 years ago. Where's the forest loss in that? We shouldn't mix up such plantations with being
a forest type - they are not. They're more like the way we grow wheat - but harvested on a longer timeframe than annually.

Not all of our woody biomass comes from abroad (though a lot does) but England is a country where only 6% of the timber we use annually comes from England. (The overall picture for the UK is skewed by Scotland which has far more commercial forestry). So we import nearly all our timber, including for all those good sustainable housing or other building projects.

Should we grow a lot more commercial timber - yes. Can we with an ever increasing population - very, very difficult if we also want to maintain a modicum of food sustainability.
User avatar
simonineaston
Posts: 8003
Joined: 9 May 2007, 1:06pm
Location: ...at a cricket ground

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by simonineaston »

Fantastic news! I have bought 10 tickets for the Labour party winter prize draw. It therefore follows, as day follows night, that I have won a Peugeot electric car !!
announcement, complete with typo...
announcement, complete with typo...
S
(on the look out for Armageddon, on board a Brompton nano & ever-changing Moultons)
Carlton green
Posts: 3645
Joined: 22 Jun 2019, 12:27pm

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by Carlton green »

Ben@Forest wrote: 21 Jan 2023, 6:54pm
Cugel wrote: 21 Jan 2023, 10:01am
Wood burning has been labelled as "green because the chopped down & burnt tree can be replaced by a newly-planted one. However ....

There's a delay of some years before the newly-planted one eats as much carbon dioxide as the large mature one chopped down.
Burning wood produces not just CO2 but lots of other noxious gases and particulates.

In a steady state tree-population human community of small and scattered size, the case for woodburning is a good one, since the overall CO2-sucking tree level is at a constant and the smoke/gas produced is widely dissipated. When millions of trees are burnt with only some managed in a steady-state tree-population fashion, wood burning seems very "ungreen", especially if you live downwind of, or close to, a vast wood-burning power station.

Mr Forest will pick apart these assumptions if incorrect, I'm sure.

Cugel
Burning wood produces CO2, but so does decaying wood. So burning it produces no more or less CO2 than wood in the natural carbon cycle. Of course it burns quicker than it grows but of course that's why short-rotation coppice, or short rotation forestry or burning 'life-expired' products has a market.

The idea that companies would deliberately try to source it from primary or old-growth forests shows no conception of forest economics. Why would a company do that when it wants an easily harvestable, uniform product which can be processed with the minimum of effort? Short-rotation forestry might be poplar harvested on a ten year rotation - on land that may never have been forest, or if it was was turned over to growing wheat or barley or beet 250 years ago. Where's the forest loss in that? We shouldn't mix up such plantations with being
a forest type - they are not. They're more like the way we grow wheat - but harvested on a longer timeframe than annually.

Not all of our woody biomass comes from abroad (though a lot does) but England is a country where only 6% of the timber we use annually comes from England. (The overall picture for the UK is skewed by Scotland which has far more commercial forestry). So we import nearly all our timber, including for all those good sustainable housing or other building projects.

Should we grow a lot more commercial timber - yes. Can we with an ever increasing population - very, very difficult if we also want to maintain a modicum of food sustainability.
Thanks for that explanation, helpful.

An unintended take away is that, at least in terms of self sufficiency, the UK is over populated. We consume more than we can grow and in order to survive here we have to transport much for other parts of the world - IMHO that’s a daft state of affairs.
Don’t fret, it’s OK to: ride a simple old bike; ride slowly, walk, rest and admire the view; ride off-road; ride in your raincoat; ride by yourself; ride in the dark; and ride one hundred yards or one hundred miles. Your bike and your choices to suit you.
User avatar
Cugel
Posts: 5430
Joined: 13 Nov 2017, 11:14am

Re: Not giving my money to the fossel fuel industry

Post by Cugel »

Ben@Forest wrote: 21 Jan 2023, 6:54pm
Burning wood produces CO2, but so does decaying wood. So burning it produces no more or less CO2 than wood in the natural carbon cycle. Of course it burns quicker than it grows but of course that's why short-rotation coppice, or short rotation forestry or burning 'life-expired' products has a market.

The idea that companies would deliberately try to source it from primary or old-growth forests shows no conception of forest economics. Why would a company do that when it wants an easily harvestable, uniform product which can be processed with the minimum of effort? Short-rotation forestry might be poplar harvested on a ten year rotation - on land that may never have been forest, or if it was was turned over to growing wheat or barley or beet 250 years ago. Where's the forest loss in that? We shouldn't mix up such plantations with being
a forest type - they are not. They're more like the way we grow wheat - but harvested on a longer timeframe than annually.

Not all of our woody biomass comes from abroad (though a lot does) but England is a country where only 6% of the timber we use annually comes from England. (The overall picture for the UK is skewed by Scotland which has far more commercial forestry). So we import nearly all our timber, including for all those good sustainable housing or other building projects.

Should we grow a lot more commercial timber - yes. Can we with an ever increasing population - very, very difficult if we also want to maintain a modicum of food sustainability.
Nothing wrong with forest plantations and using their wood for all sorts of purposes .... although I understand that some types of afforestation produce too much of a monoculture in which very little else can survive and thrive, thereby reducing bio-diversity.

The big issues seem to be:

* Burning wood as fuel for power, in very large quantities, produces pollutions and has also ended up with large scale planet-wide tree reduction.

* Forest (including old growth and bio-diverse forest like the that of the Amazon) is being cleared (wholly wasted by burning in situ, in some cases) to make farmland for mono-crops from which large profits can be made.

**********
Given that there are far better renewables now developed and developing than burning wood, it seems a peculiarly inefficient process to continue growing commercial softwoods in biodiversity-reducing swathes just for burning. Whilst fast growth spruce and fir do replace what was felled in a relatively short time, the burning process still produces other detrimental effects besides CO2 production.

There was talk, some while ago, that forestry managers like Natural Resources Wales were looking to plant more diverse forestry with a longer usage cycle - forests with a greater range of species and associated bio-diversity, as well as better uses for the timber. But the short term economics of grow-fast to sell-quicker still seems in place.

As an amateur woodworker, I'd really like to see more forestry aimed at producing a wide range of hardwoods for feedstock to what are sometimes considered to be rather old-fashioned manufacturing traditions making all sorts of things from wood rather than metal and plastics. Coppice work implements, in particular, were once highly diverse, ubiquitous and extremely useful .... as well as being what we now call "green".

Cugel
“Practical men who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence are usually the slaves of some defunct economist”.
John Maynard Keynes
Post Reply