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I too have been struggling to square this circle. Holidayed in Cornwall this year, but drove down - we couldn't have contemplated going by train because of a) the cost for four plus a dog, b) the amount of stuff we took, c) poor transport links from where we live meant going into and across London and coming back out again.
Last year was a week north of Aberdeen (Newburgh, if you know it) and we did go by train, but it was just MrsDoor and me. Flying would have been a quarter of the price and ten times quicker.
I turned down the option of going to Thailand for a family wedding in March. Bloody long way to go for a wedding IMO, but I'm one of only a few who have said no. The rest of the family are going. Makes me look like a right fun sponge.
Friends and relatives are flying all over the world at the drop of a hat (neighbours on each side are currently in Tobago and Egypt respectively), and many also fly within Britain because of the convenience, while many work colleagues go on cruises. I decided a while ago not to start the obvious conversation with them, as it has Brexit-like potential to polarise people, and who am I to tell somebody else how to spend their money. But one look at FR24 to see how many flights are in the air at any one time (13000+rn) makes me wonder whether I'm being a bit evangelical while everybody else is flying off to exotic places and having a ball. Horsehair shirts are not for me.
I try to do my bit locally, but is it enough, or are we all doomed regardless? I watch US citizens running around in their massive pickups (bestselling Ford Ranger is 22mpg) and then see the devastating floods there, and worldwide, and, while I have empathy for them, I also think that they're not really helping the situation. Obviously I'm not putting climate change causality at the door of the US here.
We can't ignore the fact that invariably climate change often hits the hardest those who are not really net contributors too.
According to a BBC article I read, aviation is responsible for about 2% of global carbon emissions.
Presumably that 2% must include things like the super rich using private jets every day, the normal rich using private jets or first class flights very often, politicians and business people going on regular "business trips" that aren't really necessary, freight ultimately heading to consumers who probably haven't considered the carbon cost of the products they are buying, whole industries like elite sport and music that involve lots of air travel etc etc.
So if you're just looking at the emissions caused by ordinary people going on holiday once or twice per year, it must just be a fairly small fraction of that 2%, which itself pales in comparison to things like energy generation.
Edit - I think I also read that going meat free some days per week is one of the most impactful thing an individual can do.
Without pointing fingers or trying to send anyone on a guilt trip, how are others squaring this circle?
Also personally struggling. I've actually flown twice in the last 21 years, the second time this Easter. MrsMC is keen we travel/fly more now the kids are grown up and before we are "too" old (her disability may colour her view) but I'm ambivalent at best, there aren't many places I think "I must see" abroad when there's so much I want to see in the UK first. This is causing some tension, I'll be honest.
That said, me taking a stand and refusing to fly means **** all when the vast majority of carbon emissions are generated by corporations, not individuals. One trip by air a year is enough for me and my conscience though.
I watch US citizens running around in their massive pickups
It's easy to pick up on that but what we in the UK don't get is that apparently more than half of US "roads" are not tarmacked. Yes, a big 22mpg pick up seems crazy to us, but if you've got a 1-2 hour gravel drive to your nearest big town to do a big shop, an i10 is going to struggle.
Air travel is too cheap, yesterday manchester to alicante was 35 quid via easyjet, ryanair was 25 quid same trip. Plane was half full.
I fly twice a year, I know some people who fly 10-20 times, just for holidays, ie, completely unnecessary. If you were taxed on a progressively higher scale the more flights you took, you may be nudged into different behaviour.
Yeah it’s nice here right now, near Mojacar… But in July August it’s just unbearably hot.. No exaggeration, you’d have to be insane to sunbathe unless first thing in the morning or at sundown. I love a bit of sun but there is a limit!
Mmmmm Badgers 🙂
Go on admit it you thought you were booking for Majorca 🙂
I’m on a lot of Spanish Facebook groups ,heres a pic of the water level on one road from the Spanish Police on the N332 group 🙁
So if you’re just looking at the emissions caused by ordinary people going on holiday once or twice per year, it must just be a fairly small fraction of that 2%, which itself pales in comparison to things like energy generation.
Maybe that's the perspective I need.
So if you’re just looking at the emissions caused by ordinary people going on holiday once or twice per year, it must just be a fairly small fraction of that 2%, which itself pales in comparison to things like energy generation.
Absolute nonsense it’s the overwhelming contributor. You may like a nice summer holiday or two to Spain but take responsibility for your own actions rather than think it’s that other bloke.
or maybe start a new thread to calculate personal emmissions..
or maybe start a new thread to calculate personal emmissions..
You really don't wan't to use the bathroom after me if I've had a few beers and a donner the night before.
@tonyf1 my logic makes sense to me. The few people who fly loads are going to have a bigger impact than normal people going on occasional holidays. But if you've got stats that disprove it then I'm open to being proved wrong.
I haven't been on a plane for nearly a decade by the way. Why so quick to judge? You don't have to answer.
Possibly, but as someone above said, after prolonged dry spells, several years in this case, the regular ground becomes pretty much rock solid, so when it does rain hard, the water isn’t absorbed into the ground… It all just runs downhill on the surface…hopefully into strategically built storm drains, but if they are obstructed, they overflow.
Similar things happened here in the U.K., a flood destroyed much of Lynton and Lynmouth, and there was Boscastle, in both cases a static storm dumped several months worth of rain onto bogs on the high ground that had been drained for grazing, etc, and the water tore through both towns in a manner similar to Valencia, but on nothing like the scale. In all instances, human interference with the local environment contributed to the flooding and destruction.
Interesting article on the been
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp8xy03zk44o
Factor in corruption and the recovery will be equally as complicated and unsatisfactory.
It’s easy to pick up on that but what we in the UK don’t get is that apparently more than half of US “roads” are not tarmacked. Yes, a big 22mpg pick up seems crazy to us, but if you’ve got a 1-2 hour gravel drive to your nearest big town to do a big shop, an i10 is going to struggle.
And only about 3% of the population use those untarmacked roads with any regularity.
3% of the US population needing a pickup/4x4 isn't the problem.
It's Chad and all his bros doing their solo daily drive from Sunnyvale to downtown San Jose in a 5.7 litre V8.
Also, from what i can remember, freight makes up less than 10% of global flights and military about 5%. The rest is fairly evenly split between commercial (airlines/holiday makers etc), private (little private planes) and then the "for hire" type stuff. The emissions per sector, i've no idea, as the typical plane size varies massively between each!
But again, the "important" stuff, moving goods and services around isn't the (major) issue with aviation. (Though it still needs to be minimised).
It's Chad and his bros (and their families) flying off to Cancun or where ever twice a year.
I lived in the Murcia region for around 20 years in a small mountain village.
There was absolutely no provision for rainwater control.The only drains were for sewage.Rain that fell collected in the streets,and ended up flowing in the same direction and all the flows coming together.
Somewhere down the valley is going to get the brunt of all these flows.And this in an area that actually needs water for agriculture yet it is allowed to flow away.At the moment here almond trees that are dead or dying are being pulled out because of the lack of water.
Murcias a funny one thou,
, rainfall in Murcia is very irregular, with an average of only 300 millimetres per year and a dry period that can last for up to 10 months of the year: “We have a Mediterranean climate where it is normal to experience a summer drought, but we have an extreme case. It should rain in autumn, spring and winter, but the peculiarity of our area is that this is not the case.”
This should, in theory, cause massive problems for Murcia, a Region that – somewhat conversely it may seem – has one of the largest and most productive fruit and vegetable agriculture industries in the country.
But it is exactly this consistent lack of rainfall that means Murcia is so well placed to deal with drought, and not suffer the consequences.
“Our water use is much higher than what we have naturally, and we have been without water for a long time because there was no water in the reservoirs, how have we always overcome this without restrictions? Because of desalinated water and water treatment plants,”
Without pointing fingers or trying to send anyone on a guilt trip, how are others squaring this circle? I’ll admit that part of me is just thinking ****.it nobody else cares so why should I?
I have not read all the replies to this
For me the key thing is to be accountable for your actions and to take what steps you reasonably can but without wearing a hair shirt. Its the travel thats as much the issue as the type of travel tho trains are generally better. One flight every few years is less damaging than several a year.
My flights to Canada this year probably had a carbon footprint similar to what I have saved in a year or two of not having a car to put it in perspective. I'm going to go to NZ next year - that will wipe out several years of savings. However thats the only long haul flights I have taken since a kid ( unless a couple of trips to the canaries count?) and I won't take any more. My last european trip was to the netherlands - car to newcastle and ferry over the north sea.
So be aware of your actions, be accountable for them. Minimise impacts where you can without impacting excessively on your quality of life. The things you do personally are a small part compared to the big things we do as a nations
There is certainly a part of me that now thinks "eff it - no one really cares and its all fubar now anyway" Not a helpful attitude.
apologies
Interesting article from the Dutch MetOffice (KNMI) explaining the high precipitation rates associated with this flood (Google translate is your friend). Don't forget that human behaviour, like not maintaining storm drains, has an influence here too.
https://www.knmi.nl/over-het-knmi/nieuws/waarom-viel-er-de-afgelopen-dagen-zoveel-regen-in-spanje
Don’t forget that human behaviour, like not maintaining storm drains, has an influence here too.
This seems to be a bit of a target for some of the upset, according to a colleague who lives nearby. Lots of discussion around lack of maintenance of storm drain systems, lack of focus on keeping nature based solutions such as trees and ground cover to prevent the hard, dry surface which promotes run-off, and a *lot* of development for decades in areas both prone to flooding or which contribute to flooding....
Valencia is a great example of what can go wrong if you play with nature, the living embodiment of flip around and find out
After the flood in 1957 they decided to re-route the river Turia around the city. There's lots of videos online about this and the wonderful park they constructed along the river's old course. Most of those videos will tell you how great it was and how radical. I guess there will be new vids coming out soon with a very different perspective.
Some interesting commentary here from an engineering perspective
Valencia is a great example of what can go wrong if you play with nature, the living embodiment of flip around and find out
Arguably it didn't go wrong - it diverted the flood waters from the centre, which would have been even worse. Interesting article, though - I hadn't considered the impact of cars (literally) when it comes to flood deaths.
With flooding of this type (flash flood/pluvial) the suspended materials, i.e. crap floating in the water, can be anything from fence panels, toys to cars, trucks, trees, cows etc
The other thing not generally appreciated is the speed at which the water moves - it's very fast! For normal river flooding it's usually a slow creep of rising water overs days until the water overtops the defences.
With flooding of this type (flash flood/pluvial) the suspended materials, i.e. crap floating in the water, can be anything from fence panels, toys to cars, trucks, trees, cows etc
Yeah, it was clear there is a lot of suspended material, but I never considered that impact from the cars themselves was one of the principal causes of death - I assumed it was people getting trapped in spaces and drowning.
I never considered that impact from the cars themselves was one of the principal causes of death
Cars are hugely problematic in flood situations. One stranded car can block a road that's needed for evacuation or for emergency access and they can get stranded ridiculously easily. Most people assume cars are far safer than they actually are but it only takes a foot of water to float most cars. And the 4x4 things that actually are capable of fording deeper than that (surprisingly few) are almost always driven by people who don't have that experience anyway. Also easy to get trapped in them, the water pressure outside will hold the doors shut and electric windows almost always fail at the first hint of water in them.
And the aftermath - as seen in Valencia - is a lot of expensive, hard-to-shift debris, cars piled on top of one another. That sort of weight being swept along in a flood is pretty lethal to anything in its path too. You've basically created a flood with hundreds of 2-ton floating boulders in it.
flood waters from the centre
it was also designed to minimise the impact of flooding on the arable land/ rice fields around the city too.
As well as cars, the suspended material in the flood water will include a lot of topsoil washed from farm land so that will impact agriculture.
It shows we are putting too much 'non-permeable' materials down everywhere. Valencia was shocking at the speed - literally went from no water, to a deep torrent in 30-45 minutes. We've got to stop building with materials that aren't permitting natural soak-away.
no water, to a deep torrent in 30-45 minuteS
Yeah, my sister lives c30lm south of Valencia- she drove into work there were just warnings of “heavy rainfall”. She parked in an underground metro car park and couldn’t get back to it.
Luckily her mother in law still lives in the city so she could stay there for a couple of days and could get back to her car.
A couple of my brother in law’s siblings live in the outlying areas. They’ve been cut off as bridges to their villages have been destroyed.
And the aftermath – as seen in Valencia – is a lot of expensive, hard-to-shift debris, cars piled on top of one another. That sort of weight being swept along in a flood is pretty lethal to anything in its path too. You’ve basically created a flood with hundreds of 2-ton floating boulders in it.
Yeah, just (perhaps naively) assumed that people wouldn't actually get in the way of that!
It shows we are putting too much ‘non-permeable’ materials down everywhere.
Realistically nothing is going to absorb that amount of water, in that short a time. Add in near-drought conditions for the past few years, and absorption isn't an option.
There's a heavy rain warning for the Calpe / Altea area about 120km south of Valencia now. (07 Nov).
My rain app is showing some rain there but much heavier over parts of the Med just east of Spain. Missing out Mallorca for the moment though.
My Spanish bro in law is In the military in Spain, he's only just been told that he'll be mobilised to help next week - word on the street is that theres still 2000+ people missing in Valencia. No idea how true that is or if it's just social media murmurs but cirtainly explains the mud throwing earlier this week. But that number was apparently reported by some news agencies (not in Spain). It cirtainly seems like the national and local governments in Spain are trying to down play the lack of response.
We’ve got to stop building with materials that aren’t permitting natural soak-away.
I don't think a soak away would have worked when there's a year's worth of rain in 24 hrs. Valencia development had rerouted a couple of natural rivers and flood routes away from built up areas - these were absolutely overrun and water will always find the quickest way down. It's a bit like building on a flood plain and then blaming the tarmac.
On a related note, anyone else remember those insane BMX videos of Ruben Alcantara riding the storm drains around Malaga on a BMX?
Private jets make up 10% of all UK departures according to the below, so a bit more than your 0.0000001%!
They are completely unnecessary so if the goal is to reduce emissions caused by aviation then surely we should at least start there.
Separately I've seen stats saying about 12% of commercial airline passengers are business travellers and that 7% of all flights are cargo flights.
So in total that leaves 71% of flights as commercial leisure flights. Within that you've still got a load of first & business class seats for which carbon emissions per seat are about four times higher than economy. Again, surely curtailing these unnecessary luxuries should take precedence?
Then you have people who fly a lot. I can't find any stats on that but I'm sure there are is no shortage of moderately wealthy people flying around all over the place on a regular basis.
All in all it seems to me like ordinary people taking an occasional holiday probably make up about 50% of all aviation, which itself is only responsible for 2% of global emissions.
I understand that the science says we need to cut emissions, but stopping ordinary people taking holidays and enjoying their life feels like an odd category to focus on when there are so many easier and bigger tickets wins that should surely take priority.
Not wishing to be flamed for unnecessary flights but genuinely looking for advice.
5 of us booked to go to Prades (NNW of Tarragona) on 24th November for some biking/climbing type fun.
Does anyone with local knowledge have any advice in terms of practicality and whether it is better not to travel or better to go and spend tourist dollar?
Private jets make up 10% of all UK departures according to the below, so a bit more than your 0.0000001%!
That's was actually a reference to Trumps big plane being one of a handful of the most egregious tip of the melting iceberg.
Does it give any details of what that 10% entails behind the paywall? Because looking out the window (not a million miles from Heathrow and Farnborough) I would have put it at that if it included anything not a commercial jet (so everything from the military to a single engined cesna) .
I'm not saying we shouldn't tax private jets into extinction. I'm saying what's the point in saying "I'm not changing anything to help society untill that sociopathic private jet flyer does". Because the problem there is you just know they won't so you won't have to ever face your end of that bargain.
i cant talk for the specific area, but i've not seen any advice against travelling, keep an eye on the news.
unless you are hoping for weather related reassurance, three weeks is a long time in weather forecasting IME.
I stopped singing "rain rain go to Spain, in a chocolate aeroplane" last week.
Would never cancel plans based on weather forecast, I live in Scotland!
I find the necessity vs. proportion of emissions argument interesting, Facebook has taken to feeding me American monster truck/hill climbing videos recently.
So as not to sound like a kill-joy I'll admit the actual videos are great fun, but it signified to me just how impossibly far we still have to go if anyone thinks it is at all reasonable to be burning buckets of fuel just to get a very souped up car to the top of a dirt pile in the most spectacular way possible (or worse, revving your monster truck to death whilst slowly sinking into a mud pit).
You could argue that hill-climbing events (or dare I say it, something like the six day trial in Scotland? An event I was quite prepared to drive around behind spectating...) are a vanishingly small proportion of global emissions, but when weighted by actual necessity they're probably not far removed from literally just pouring the fuel down the drain.
So how do you weigh 'must holiday somewhere with guaranteed sun' or 'must have a laugh getting drunk and racing cars up dirt piles' against 'must stay warm' or 'must ship raw materials around the globe'. Opposite ends of a very broad spectrum I suspect.
We're screwed either way though, can you imagine the politician who tried to ban any form of petrol fuelled entertainment? Banning F1 or WRC? Good luck...
I'd ban F1 as it's incredibly dull and it's followers are often the same (but I'd hide that in a Climate Change narrative)
😉
@LD Prades is in a stunning location between the vineyards of the Priorat and mountains of the Montsant with rock climbing at Siurana and Margalef and hundreds of km of mountainbike trails. The Volta a Montsant is 170km of fairly difficult terrain that I did over 3 days with MrsPB a few years ago. Prades itself won't be busy this time of year but is rammed in the summer, I'm assuming you have transport as it's worth exploring places like Montblanc, Escaladei, Castellfollit and Poblet monastery. Wikiloc is the best resource for rides of every type, PM me if you need any more help, I'm up for showing you round if you like.
So how do you weigh ‘must holiday somewhere with guaranteed sun’ or ‘must have a laugh getting drunk and racing cars up dirt piles’ against ‘must stay warm’ or ‘must ship raw materials around the globe’. Opposite ends of a very broad spectrum I suspect.
The problem comes when you try and allocate that carbon footprint. No one want's to own it.
Someone on the last page complained that it was global corporations that emitted the most. Which is true, but those are your/our emissions. Shell aren't sat there burning oil for the sake of it, it's just that they have to burn a proportion of the oil that comes out the ground to create the energy to process it into diesel to run your car. For every gallon that you put in, somewhere int he production chain they've probably burnt about an extra pint to get it to you in a useable form. If you want Shell to cut it's emissions, stop buying Diesel.
Same with motorsport. it's a global circus funded by viewers. The carbon footprint of you watching an F1 race isn't your 100W TV x 2 hours = 0.2kWh converted into CO2 by whatever the grids current mix is. It's the footprint of the whole shebang, divided amongst the consumers. Otherwise where would it stop, blaming HGV divers for truck emissions?
I’ll post this and a link to an old article on Murcia Today it’s stuff to be aware of whilst planning your winter get away to parts over here.
It’s a thing I’d not known about till riding/walking around here and the locals warning me to be careful…
The Gota Fría is the popular name given in Spain to a meteorological phenomenon which can cause devastating flooding, especially in the south-east of the country along the Mediterranean coast, and which often occurs either generally or locally in the months of September and October.
Although the native population is accustomed to the heavy autumn storms, these can be terrifying for those unaccustomed to Spanish autumn weather, and can also be extremely dangerous for foreign visitors/residents who are unaware of the potential dangers, hence the need to know what constitutes a Gota Fría and why it is so dangerous
https://murciatoday.com/what-is-a-gota-fría_120983-a.html