the level of smugness in your posts is intolerable.
For goodness sake get a grip. Intolerable??
I think TJ would perhaps be more effective in providing convincing arguments for some of his obviously strongly held views if he attempted to be more subtle, but that's a problem for him. To describe it as intolerable or call for a permanent ban, as suggested earlier, is frankly ridiculous.
Probably the worst thing you can do for your environmental footprint is have children
Does that mean that their lifetime carbon footprint is transferred onto me and they get let off? Or do we just count it twice? It's maybe a little twee but do we ignore that there is a non-zero probability that someone's future child will make a discovery of some kind that solves all the world's problems? I find the "children are an environmental disaster" argument very defeatist, likely extrapolated poorly from some misrepresented carbon footprint maths, and is certainly not one that those hopeful for the future of humanity would use.
The main problem is that for the last 100 years or so the entire planet has been built around the availability of relatively cheap motorised vehicles and relatively easy to produce hydrocarbon fuels. Our cities and suburbs and transport systems and supply lines, all have developed the way they have around this fact. The way we get our food, how we are educated, the way we receive healthcare, the way we work, the way we relax, the way we live, all this revolves around motorised transport and/or petrochemicals in one way or another. Yes, certain people are fortunate enough to eschew this way of life, but all the "your life choices are bad for the environment" proselytising in the world won't mitigate the fact that we are WAAYYYY too entrenched in how human society has developed for the last century for there ever to be an immediate global-scale shift to something else. We just need to do what we can do. Switching to EVs, solar power, public transport, etc. are examples - albeit mostly expensive and out of the average person's reach - whereas railing on people because they can't afford to live a cough and a spit from their place of work isn't.
I've been lucky enough to live close enough to work to walk there every day for the past 15 yrs or so. My wife has walked to work for 4 yrs. We have one car for family duties.
My work is due to be "centralised" along with several other sites across lancs and Cumbria. The new site is a 30 mile commute for me. It is not adequately serviced by public transport (would take 1.5hrs by bike, train and bus) and I would be expected to take part in 24/7 shifts so unlikely that public transport would always fit with start/finish times.
In order to relocate for that, my wife would have to give up the job she loves and my daughter would have to leave her school and we would be leaving my father in law behind to fend for himself.
I could change jobs, but I would have to retrain in something entirely new as there is most definitely nothing similar locally. Besides, I actually like my job fortunately, hence I've never moved on.
But woe is me eh?
But then again, there's 200+ people at my work, all in a similar situation. A lot with partners, husband's, wives, kids, elderly parents. And at last count, the total of number of staff being relocated to the new site was 777. All with kids, partners etc. How does that get resolved without a load of people just driving about all over the county?
Living close to work is not always a black and white situation.
The world is already massively overpopulated and more people consuming more resources is just making the problem worse.
If everyone who wants to have kids has no more than two, the population will decline.
If everyone has no kids or even just one, there will be significant societal problems that will then need solving.
Don't over-simplify the problem we face.
Point being: not everyone is going to stop having children tomorrow.
If they are that bad for the environment......they probably should.
Right after they moved next door to their Victorian mill
Hold on....it's the China model.
Does that mean that their lifetime carbon footprint is transferred onto me and they get let off? Or do we just count it twice? It’s maybe a little twee but do we ignore that there is a non-zero probability that someone’s future child will make a discovery of some kind that solves all the world’s problems?
If you didn't have children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, etc, etc then none of the environmental damage they cause would ever happen. If you have fewer the the environmental damage they cause will be reduced.
They might well solve all the problems, but there's a (probably greater, given humans propensity for it) chance that they will invent something which adds to the issues
.
If everyone has no kids or even just one, there will be significant societal problems that will then need solving.
Don’t over-simplify the problem we face.
This is true, but the societal problems of a declining population will be nothing compared to the environmental problems caused by an increasing one.
It is the elephant in the room in a lot of discussions.
The compulsion in the China model, while undoubtedly effective, would no doubt be unpopular in a democracy, but a change in attitudes where more people elect to have fewer/none would be a very good thing.
TJ – you seem to live in a different world / the world has changed since you bought your propert(ies).
this is certainly true to a large extent - as above I could not buy anywhere now on the salary I earnt. Not that I would have to move out of the city but that I would be renting for life
I think what a lot of you are missing tho is I have been deliberately living a low carbon lifestyle all my life. many of the choices I have made are made in the light of this. Even being a nurse was in part so.
He is back and allowed to continue his old form and it drags down threads which is a shame.
Agreed.
I think this is unjust towards tj. Whilst not even he could deny he has an abrasive style at times, he has not shown it on this thread imho. There are a significant number of threads where a large number of people are in agreement - once enough posts have been made, any alternative view is quashed. Worse still, anyone exposing those views is ‘attacked’.
Tj makes several valid points, as do his detractors- but there is little denying that the way we live now is unsustainable. We have got to where we are, incrementally over a long time. Most people feel that they are entitled to make whatever choices they want and (deliberately or not) turn a blind eye to the consequences.
I think what a lot of you are missing tho is I have been deliberately living a low carbon lifestyle all my life. many of the choices I have made are made in the light of this. Even being a nurse was in part so.
I think we know this, you bang on about it every time these threads come up. But what's your actual point? We need soultions at a societal level. Flashing your credentials on an internet forum all the time just doesn't help anything.
Whilst not even he could deny he has an abrasive style at times, he has not shown it on this thread imho
The problem with internet arguing is that as soon as you start talking about how great you personally are, it is an implicit comparison between you and other people who then feel attacked. And a bun-fight ensues. I'm aware of this and as you can see I'm struggling.
that is your reaction to the uncomfortable truths I say
and you wonder why people react to you in the way they do…
If you didn’t have children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, etc, etc then none of the environmental damage they cause would ever happen. If you have fewer the the environmental damage they cause will be reduced.
Yeah but that's their carbon footprint, not mine. Or if it's on me then what falls on them? Is my carbon footprint actually owned by my parents?
Living close to work is not always a black and white situation.
Which takes us back to the point made by @TheFlyingOx directly above yours as to how society as a whole has evolved / developed to live like this and how sudden shocks to the system (like the price / availability of oil) will have a huge impact on so many people.
And it's like that because (as per my point earlier), we've not built any reliable alternatives. Cycling is fine for short distances but not when there's no safe infrastructure, no safe place to lock or store a bike.
Train / bus / tram are OK in the places that they exist and work reliably which is few and far between and is generally not a full time replacement for a car, it's simply an alternative to driving into a city centre.
Features of modern life such as out-of-town shopping centres, satellite/commuter belt developments have all added to the *need* to own or have access to a car and the lack of that (due to cost, disability, age etc) has a very real bearing on social inclusion as well as access to opportunities such as education and employment. If you're stuck in a low-paid job in Town X and you can't afford to buy a car, get the bus etc to a higher paid job in Town Y, then you're never going to get out of that rut.
Agree, crazy-legs, this is why we need strong government control in how society is organised. Neoliberalism simply does not work, and we are where we are because of 40 years of it.
Train / bus / tram are OK in the places that they exist and work reliably which is few and far between and is generally not a full time replacement for a car, it’s simply an alternative to driving into a city centre.
This is hamstrung by the idea that public transport has to be profitable. Profit-driven ompanies will only build PT where the highest housing density is and to the city centre. This means it's often unusable for people who aren't going to town, which breaks the whole concept.
Happily the Welsh Govt are working on a solution in SE Wales, and I can't wait for it.
I think what a lot of you are missing tho is I have been deliberately living a low carbon lifestyle all my life.
from previous threads and i may be wrong but i thought you had travelled the world quite a lot on some fantastic adventures , certainly more than i have and where planning on doing it more in retirement.
Yeah but that’s their carbon footprint, not mine. Or if it’s on me then what falls on them? Is my carbon footprint actually owned by my parents?
It's less about 'allocating' it to a particular person and more about breaking a chain of causation. You cause your children's carbon footprint, they cause your grandchildren's and so on and so on. Remove one link of that chain and the problem stops getting worse just there.
I think we know this, you bang on about it every time these threads come up. But what’s your actual point? We need solutions at a societal level. Flashing your credentials on an internet forum all the time just doesn’t help anything.
100% this!
A new narrative oil companies have been pushing is that these companies don't need regulating, it's down to personal choice of the consumer.
It's nonsense.
TJ is actually showing how hard it is to solve this problem through personal choice. How many people have decided to live like him after reading his posts??
Personal choice will never solve this. The system needs to change. The easiest choice to make needs to be the most environmentally friendly. Currently the opposite is true.
The kids thing is also nonsense. It assumes the next generation will live like the previous generation, and that's not true otherwise we'd never have got into this mess in the first place. Populations in developed countries are already declining anyway. Kids are often the ones out in the street protesting at the mess the previous generation have made and are refusing to clean up!
Public transport is woeful in this country – infrequent, unreliable and very expensive.
Yes it is. Has been since nearly a hundred years ago when it was decided that ‘private motor vehicles all the way for everything’ was the way forwards forever. Especially in the UK.
We live in a village with few amenities (I’d rather not live here, but I can afford to live here – like most of our friends here). There are 2 buses per day to the nearest town (Mon-Fri), which don’t link in to buses onwards to the city. If you work, you need a car – there are no easy/safe cycle routes.
Car (EV)-sharing/lift-sharing would be the ideal short-term goal in such a village?
Better public transport and cycling infra looking ahead? We are crippled not only by this government (and past, and no doubt successive) but also by the lack of public will/motivation to make changes and to push for change.
Remove one link of that chain and the problem stops getting worse just there.
This is being addressed, UK birth rate is 1.65 kids per woman.
EV car-sharing/lift-sharing would be the ideal short-term goal.
A social democratic government could fix that problem straight away, doesn't need any complexity or EV takeup.
the thing with the massive rise in fuel/gas/electric general living cost is many people are literally not going to be able to do anything but exist
regardless of if you use trains buses etc for hobbies to keep fit mentally and physically or just living.
then the wider economics of it are devastating truly devastating
the thing with the massive rise in fuel/gas/electric general living cost is many people are literally not going to be able to do anything but exist
Quite. So the even deeper question still is do we have a right to do anything other than simply exist? Is a government obliged to provide us with anything other than the means to simply exist? Should it be our goal as a society to give people opportunities to do more than simply exist?
The problem with all this next generation nonsense is that one isn’t needed. The problem with the environmental debate is that it assumes that humans have a right to last indefinitely as a species. We don’t we are merely passing through. The planet will take care of itself just as it has for the last several billion years
It’s less about ‘allocating’ it to a particular person and more about breaking a chain of causation. You cause your children’s carbon footprint, they cause your grandchildren’s and so on and so on. Remove one link of that chain and the problem stops getting worse just there.
Yes I get that, I'm just being facetious. I just have a problem with a) the argument makes assumptions about how the future generations will conduct themselves, and b) the argument doesn't take into account the fact that if we're going to sort the mess out then we'll need people around to do it. It's a childish faux-intellectual soundbite for the pious to throw around as if it goes any way towards solving the problem - "people cause enviromental damage, so why don't we just get rid of people?" 🤷♂️
well thats a whole other question, no need for anything at all to exist in that case, press the big red nuke button
I'll bet TJ's lunch money that pressure will be put on the oil producing nations to increase production to decrease prices. Or alternatively prices will drop once Putin stops/is stopped bombing Ukraine back to the middle ages.
Either way, petrol prices will come down again. Everyone but TJ will sigh in relief, probably
I’ll bet TJ’s lunch money that pressure will be put on the oil producing nations to increase production to decrease prices.
They're already thinking this. Concern in the middle eastern OPEC countries is that high fuel prices will drive consumers to EVs. Given that many of them have large portions of their economies reliant on production of hydrocarbons I don't think it'll be long before the taps are opened fully.
as above I could not buy anywhere now on the salary I earnt. Not that I would have to move out of the city but that I would be renting for life
TJ (I'm not having a go at you), however you have just admitted that if you were a bit younger, you'd have to rent for life if you had made the same career/life choices. Would you really do that now? really?
I'm guessing you are retired and mortgage free, possibly with a top up to your pension via your rental property? Would you be happy to not have that rental income, andalso have to pay rent out of your pension for the rest of your life.
No. I don't think anyone would choose that option.
Alternatively, like many nurses today, you might have to live out of the city - somewhere cheaper to have any hope of not renting for life.
Probably the worst thing you can do for your environmental footprint is have chaildren
Mleh the rate of population growth as fallen off a cliff, and gross numbers aren't growing nearly as fast as they were in the 60's
The problem with the environmental debate is that it assumes that humans have a right to last indefinitely as a species. We don’t we are merely passing through. The planet will take care of itself just as it has for the last several billion years
Well this is reducing to the ultimate nihilism, but the planet won't 'take care' of itself because without a sentient value system there is no concept of 'care' or right or wrong, things just happen. The only reason anyone cares about the planet is because humans exist.
We already have changed the planet massively, but then so have bacteria and plants and animals. All of this fannying about worrying about greeny eco stuff is purely human. So this is becoming a philosophical debate.
You could very easily end up in a situation where doors close to people as the costs rise but there are no affordable alternative transport options or equivalent local work. Which would be a disaster. It would almost certainly affect people already disadvantaged in the labour market and the low paid the most (e.g. Someone attempting to get back into work after paternity leave etc).
This is already the case. You just don’t know those people. Not being able to take a job, or being sanctioned while out of work for not travelling to an interview on a trading estate only accessible by car, is already a thing.
Very much so Kelvin.
Alternatively, like many nurses today, you might have to live out of the city – somewhere cheaper to have any hope of not renting for life.
Nope - I would never live where I had to drive to work - its a red line for me. also I could not afford to buy anywhere now on a nurse salery in the lothians Not in the 'burbs, not a flat in the city, perhaps an ex council flat on a peripheral estate. Certainly not a house within commuting distance
My choice would be rent for life or move to a much cheaper area IE not take the job in Edinburgh
Edit - its very hard to second guess but the likely thing would have been to find an area I could afford to buy in on a nurses salary and get a job there. Again part of the reason I became a nurse is for the easy availability of work. Probably borders or fife
A social democratic government could fix that problem straight away, doesn’t need any complexity or EV takeup.
How so? Straight away?
An organised and motivated village community could fix it ‘straight’ away. Truth is that neither effective ‘social democratic’ government or ‘effective community’ exist in our society. This is the insular, car-centric (and let’s face it overwhelmingly selfish/overly-convenient) ‘society’/infrastructure that we’ve continued to put in place for the last half a century, completely disregarding all of the ‘early’ warnings. At this point we are most of us convenience-drunk hyper-consumers living in semi-virtual bubbles, tinkering around the edge of a rapidly widening chasm, the edge of which is already hitting those whom have the least the hardest.
ie up to 50% of those now living in Bangladesh’s urban slums (over 2m people) probably moved closer to the city because they were forced to flee their rural homes as a result of riverbank flooding.
How so? Straight away?
Buy more busses, pay more bus drivers, put more busses on. Done.
Truth is that neither effective ‘social democratic’ government or ‘effective community’ exist in our society.
Absolutely. We don't have effective government. I believe that governments need to manage society, not just do the minimum and let whatever happens happen.
It's interesting that much of the "fuel poverty" debate is centered around heating, but almost no discussion of folks being forced to drive to work. It's fine to talk about making a choice of living where you work, but for folks who don't have that choice, (through lack of opportunities, education, entrenched poverty etc etc) If you're working shift patterns in a low paid job, often car ownership is the only way you get to the business estates that these sorts of jobs are located on.
One thing I am with TJ on from reading his input I'm other threads is that EV cars will not solve the problem. They're an easy buzzword for politicians to band about to say they've done something to fix the problem but they're actually the opposite - they excuse personal car ownership and encourage continued overconsumption of resources.
If the problem is to be fixed (which I have stated I don't believe it has to be) then frankly personal car ownership needs to vanish entirely. I don't want that thought.
Except this morning because cars are a bloody pain in the arse and I'm about to spend 6 hours taking my car door apart to replace a broken window lifter... Curse these things.
pay more bus drivers
You are Reg Varney and I claim my...
I have been accused of not offering solutions. Of course ideally we need a time machine as above this has been building for 30 years and was known about 30 years ago
All the below takes a generation to do
Move to carbon taxation. tax on the amount of pollution created. low pollution stuff becomes cheaper, high pollution more expensive
Ramp up petrol prices and use that money to subsidise public transport
Use town planning to reduce car reliance. Stop the building of peripheral megastores. Keep the shops in the towns and cities and villages ( look to the netherlands - this is what they have done. their city and towncentres are still alive as shopping cntres, they do not have megastores ( especially food stores) out on the periphery)
Yes. We scoff at people in the US struggling with petrol at $2.50 a gallon but their lives have been built around cars even more than ours, and people are on the bread line as it is. So yeah an increase of $1 on their petrol prices is a big problem. And because their fuel tax is a lot lower, they are more exposed proportionally to oil price fluctuations. Fuel prices can double in a matter of months.
Stop the building of peripheral megastores. Keep the shops in the towns and cities and villages
I am not sure this is anywhere near as big of a problem as the fact people have to drive to work. If you live in Merthyr, you can shop locally, you can get a bus into town and you can get your food delivered. But you might have to drive 25 miles and 1hr each way to get to work. I think this is probably a much bigger issue and it's a lot harder to solve.
but their lives have been built around cars even more than ours,
The US; especially the centre/ mid-west only really works - as it exists now if you have cheap fuel.
Either way, petrol prices will come down again.
Maybe short term (possibly with some Government intervention to cut duty) but everyone knows that fuel is a necessity for the way of life we have and the majority of people are going to suck it up somehow. A few less other luxuries, one less holiday or whatever but most people will continue buying fuel - maybe not at the same level as before if they're using the car less / driving more economically but the oil companies know that the entire world is built on their output and they'll do just enough to keep the prices manageable and keep their profits coming. Once it's been shown that petrol at £1.80/l can exist and people will pay for it, it'll creep back up there fairly quickly.
Buy more busses, pay more bus drivers, put more busses on. Done.
No, that just adds to existing congestion. No point putting a dozen buses on if they're going to be sat in the current level of traffic and if the fares are the current level of unaffordable.
You need to get people out of cars first; you can do that by a combination of schemes such as bus priority routes, 24/7 bus lanes, city centre car park charging, LTNs, ULEZ / Clean Air Zone and using the funds generated from that to pay for a gradual increase in bus services. Chucking a dozen new bus routes in solves nothing, in fact it adds to congestion. Most of the modal shift to buses comes from existing walking and cycling trips, not existing car trips.
Alternatively, like many nurses today, you might have to live out of the city – somewhere cheaper to have any hope of not renting for life
And then have to drive everywhere. But only because everyone drives everywhere. All this fairness talk needs to remember that we have made driving essential away from city centres because we “all” drive. What happens to the young, the old, the poor, the disabled…? We have made it so that not driving, through choice or situation, is itself a handicap. It doesn’t need to be. It is the result of our addiction to cars.
Not sure what petty bickering is on the thread, once I saw tjagain’s involvement I knew there was nothing worth reading after the first page. But, this fuel price situation has got me seriously ****ing miserable… I buy an ebike so I can continue riding to work through various ailments. Two days after owning it I get another leg injury, can’t even walk now, so will be driving everywhere. ****ing grim.
It is the result of our addiction to cars.
And how did we become addicted to cars? Neoliberal government policy.
No, that just adds to existing congestion.
Not out in the countryside, which is what I was talking about.
Stop the building of peripheral megastores. Keep the shops in the towns and cities and villages ( look to the netherlands – this is what they have done. their city and towncentres are still alive as shopping cntres, they do not have megastores ( especially food stores) out on the periphery)
In Alnwick we have a growing small retail park, less then 20 years ago it was fields. It’s now a leisure centre, sainsburys, Argos, Homebase, Pets@home, M&S food, Starbucks, local butcher food hall and others are due.
It’s allowed those at the other end of town somewhere closer to shop as there’s a Morrisons at the other end. Meanwhile in the town centre shops that where once mainly chains there are now small independent shops, we’ve had 4 independent pubs open up in less than 2 years. It’s not all bad news when it comes to out of town shopping.
Public transport needs huge investment, drop the subs for air travel, no privately owned bus companies for public transport or trains.
I moved for my job 27 years ago, it held me back on career choices I wanted to do due travelling, I walk to work. I’ve gone through a restructure and now face a third of my shifts travelling to Newcastle to start work. I could drop down to a different role but I’d take a financial hit and probably have to drive to work for every shift. Not everyone has the chance in life to have circumstances and choices that allow them the ‘ideal’ green life.
But you might have to drive 25 miles and 1hr each way to get to work.
Bad, but more than half of car trips nationally are less than five miles. Modern ICE vehicles can emit twice as much pollution in the first five minutes of running.