Human civilizaton will end around 2050

[Timothy]

4 hours ago, Doug1o29 said:

Never blame on malice what can be explained by incompetence.

Whether industry can operate using wind or solar depends on the industry.  Iron and steel can't.  Aluminum could.  But first you have to build the wind turbines to run it.  Otherwise, your aluminum plant is seriously cutting into your power supply.  Sounds like Australia is underpowered to begin with.  If you're having black-outs and brown-outs, it's because you don't have enough power.- build more windmills.

Once it's generated, electric power is electric power.  There's no difference between wind-generated and coal or gas-generated electricity.  It's all about putting enough generators out there to do the job.

Doug

Hi Doug,

Just to offer another Aussie opinion: The blackouts in Victoria in Feb this year were a non-issue for most. Power was deliberately cut to ~200,000 consumers for up to two hours.  

There was a 40°C heat wave at the time, one generator down for scheduled maintenance and two had unplanned outages. 

Yes there was not enough electricity available for demand at the time and the Portland VIC smelter etc. was paid to switch off for a bit, but the system worked as it was meant to and the actual power cuts were planned and deliberate. It’s part of the contingency and allows for this situation to possibly occur once a month. Consumers were advised beforehand and the cuts happened as expected.

Having said that, my power didn’t go off, and the only time in the last ~10 years I’ve experienced blackouts was once at UNI in 2008 or 2009 for bit of an evening. Other than that, just the lights flickering sometimes during local electrical storms etc.

If people wanted to, we could pay in our taxes to build another plant and always have excess power and 100% supply for demand. But it’s not really economical. And people want to spend their $$ on other stuff.

The current system is getting old and will be supplemented as required, but it works and the ‘blackouts’ are not a major issue for the vast majority of people who live here. (‘blackouts’ because it wasn’t as big an issue as @tmcom is making it sound. Most people here wouldn’t really bat an eyelid at what happened.) @tmcom do you have a bit of an aluminium chip on your shoulder or something? You have some strong opinions!

(Also: I’m sure you’re aware, but yes you spell it ‘aluminum’ and we spell it ‘aluminium’, which explains the contrasting verbal pronunciation. )

See you in 2051 at some civilized location!

[Timothy]

47 minutes ago, AllPossible said:

The rich will be fine. In fact most of the rich will be dead by then. People in power now will not be alive when this apocalypse happens so would they even care. Sad greedy world

In 2051, Trumps head may be in a jar (not dissimilar to those in Futurama), functional and sustained by the perpetual tears of Mexicans. 

[Tatetopa]

1 hour ago, pallidin said:

No disrespect to Eldorado, as he is only offering the article for consideration, but I have to say that this is blatantly absurd.

Why is it blatantly absurd?   This scenario may not be well supported by data, but  i bet bookmakers have odds on humanity's civilization survival past 2050.  All kinds of things might knock us back to the stone age.

[Tatetopa]

10 minutes ago, Timothy said:

In 2051, Trumps head may be in a jar (not dissimilar to those in Futurama), functional and sustained by the perpetual tears of Mexicans. 

No reason for even his kids to keep his head in a jar.  They can let him strike a deal with god and see if he gets his name on anything in heaven.  Meanwhile, they take his money.

[qxcontinuum]

In Canada and some parts from Eastern Europe the winter of 2018 and 2019 has been one of the longest and the coldest on records. We're in June and temperatures still drop down to 6 degrees C at night. Elders are saying that they have never seen or experienced such long-lasting colder temperatures. 

One of my neighbors is a very famous gardner. A few of his plants have not made flowers in the last 3 years due to cold weather.

I do not see a global warming by contrary i see a cooling down. This planet can easily take 3 Celsius over. The real problem is cutting of the forest and neverending wild life habitat shrink created by supra population.

Edited June 4, 2019 by qxcontinuum

[+Desertrat56]

10 minutes ago, qxcontinuum said:

In Canada and some parts from Eastern Europe the winter of 2018 and 2019 has been one of the longest and the coldest on records. We're in June and temperatures still drop down to 6 degrees C at night. Elders are saying that they have never seen or experienced such long-lasting colder temperatures. 

One of my neighbors is a very famous gardner. A few of his plants have not made flowers in the last 3 years due to cold weather.

I do not see a global warming by contrary i see a cooling down. This planet can easily take 3 Celsius over. The real problem is cutting of the forest and neverending wild life habitat shrink created by supra population.

It is not global warming, it is climate change.  Some places experience hotter weather while some experience colder weather.  Often this kind of thing has led to ice ages like the small one in Europe over 700 years ago.

[EBE Hybrid]

Whether or not the weather is being influenced by human actions, I personally think that overpopulation will lead to greater problems for civilisation. It doesn't seem too unlikely a scenario that conflicts could occur over the resources required to maintain the lifestyle we've come to take for granted

 

[+and-then]

4 hours ago, Tatetopa said:

Well, is pollution a more immediate problem than climate change?  We seem to be burying ourselves in plastic waste and absorbing all sorts of chemicals into our bodies a lot more quickly than the earth is warming.

THAT'S the spirit!  "It could always be worse"   Seriously though, humanity will survive even if the climate change doomsayers are correct.  It may sound hateful to say it but our population is due a thinning.  Historically speaking, not politically speaking.

[Tatetopa]

1 hour ago, and then said:

THAT'S the spirit!  "It could always be worse"   Seriously though, humanity will survive even if the climate change doomsayers are correct.  It may sound hateful to say it but our population is due a thinning.  Historically speaking, not politically speaking.

Yeah.  I thought so.  Pollution does seem like a human caused problem that is a bit more manageable than climate change.    And I agree, you are probably right.  Everything would be a little easier with  fewer people.  I wonder if the China one child policy would ever catch on in countries that average eight because six of them never reach adulthood.

[+and-then]

1 minute ago, Tatetopa said:

I wonder if the China one child policy would ever catch on in countries that average eight because six of them never reach adulthood.

I doubt it.  Those children are the only social welfare system available to them.

[Harte]

7 hours ago, Piney said:

All my sister's "climate change" whistlehead friends who use disposable everything. 

In my own personal nod to conservation, I stopped using a blow drier.

Once most of my hair fell out,

Harte

[pallidin]

"Doom-and-Gloom" is certainly a somewhat healthy consideration... to a point.

It can help us to get a "grip" on critical issues during each generation.

But to flat-out suggest that the world will end "by such-and-such date or time-frame" is simply ridiculous, overly pessimistic and borderline psychotic.

Recall that, without exception, there have been people's within society from the very dawn of civilization which seem literally obsessed with impending global tragedy.

Yet humanity has survived, and as a whole is doing just fine.

We must always be vigilant of course, and effort to take corrective actions as needed to address the unique challenges of each generation, but to have a set-attitude of imminent fatalism is improper and unhealthy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Piney]

48 minutes ago, Harte said:

In my own personal nod to conservation, I stopped using a blow drier.

Once most of my hair fell out,

Harte

What about for your moustache? 

[tmcom]

10 hours ago, Doug1o29 said:

Never blame on malice what can be explained by incompetence.

Whether industry can operate using wind or solar depends on the industry.  Iron and steel can't.  Aluminum could.  But first you have to build the wind turbines to run it.  Otherwise, your aluminum plant is seriously cutting into your power supply.  Sounds like Australia is underpowered to begin with.  If you're having black-outs and brown-outs, it's because you don't have enough power.- build more windmills.

Once it's generated, electric power is electric power.  There's no difference between wind-generated and coal or gas-generated electricity.  It's all about putting enough generators out there to do the job.

Doug

Build more wind turbines, lol, thanks for the laugh, so we use 150 tonnes of coal, or china does, (with our coal) and create something that will most likely not give it all back to us, so it looks like we are fighting climate change?

Some 18 year old green fanatic may buy it but l don't!

And what happens when there is no wind, which there usually is for 3 days to a week, several times a year over typically three states in Australia, smelter shutdown and power blackouts!

8 hours ago, Farmer77 said:

Truthfully I kinda wish folks would stop talking about climate change. It seems we could reach the same goals with much less resistance if we rebranded the conversation to just be about pollution.

No, we need the green nutters to run rampant and children try to shame us.

7 hours ago, pallidin said:

Our civilization will end around 2050?

No disrespect to Eldorado, as he is only offering the article for consideration, but I have to say that this is blatantly absurd.

Sounds like a weird "agenda-push"

Yes, last ditch effort to secure funding for the next 30 odd years, since countries are increasingly voting against it, or the bandwagon is losing its wheels, or the horse is almost dead, so shock the horse, feed it redbull and it may spring back into action just long enough to reach the trough for one last binge.

5 hours ago, Timothy said:

Hi Doug,

Just to offer another Aussie opinion: The blackouts in Victoria in Feb this year were a non-issue for most. Power was deliberately cut to ~200,000 consumers for up to two hours.  

There was a 40°C heat wave at the time, one generator down for scheduled maintenance and two had unplanned outages. 

Yes there was not enough electricity available for demand at the time and the Portland VIC smelter etc. was paid to switch off for a bit, but the system worked as it was meant to and the actual power cuts were planned and deliberate. It’s part of the contingency and allows for this situation to possibly occur once a month. Consumers were advised beforehand and the cuts happened as expected.

Having said that, my power didn’t go off, and the only time in the last ~10 years I’ve experienced blackouts was once at UNI in 2008 or 2009 for bit of an evening. Other than that, just the lights flickering sometimes during local electrical storms etc.

If people wanted to, we could pay in our taxes to build another plant and always have excess power and 100% supply for demand. But it’s not really economical. And people want to spend their $$ on other stuff.

The current system is getting old and will be supplemented as required, but it works and the ‘blackouts’ are not a major issue for the vast majority of people who live here. (‘blackouts’ because it wasn’t as big an issue as @tmcom is making it sound. Most people here wouldn’t really bat an eyelid at what happened.) @tmcom do you have a bit of an aluminium chip on your shoulder or something? You have some strong opinions!

(Also: I’m sure you’re aware, but yes you spell it ‘aluminum’ and we spell it ‘aluminium’, which explains the contrasting verbal pronunciation. )

See you in 2051 at some civilized location!

Yeah, non issue, one asthmatic in his hot house had his family pick him up since he was in a bad way, (stinkin hot house) and went to their house with the power on, and another stuck in a lift, almost died due to excessive or stifling conditions.
 

And it was 42°C!

As expected, lol, if Hazelwood wasn't closed down by a ***wit, and turned into a Carp Farm, then the smelter wouldn't have had to been partially closed down, and made noncompetitive, (Read the Financial Review a week or two back).

Not a big issue, sure, l didn't have my power off either and it was only inner city dimwits that voted this idiot back in that got clobbered, (good job). But with the coal plant in NSW being shut down in a few years time, (eventhough the NSW gov, could have bought it, too stupid) and our aging coal fired plants, this will happen again, and again.......

 

And the smelter, in the meantime becomes a train wreck and should be shut down for good, or our dimwit outsted, or the smelter has to build its own coal fired plant, (yes, can't beat that for dumb).

 

Yeah, see you in 2030 when nothing happens and 2040 when no impending doom happens, and 2050 when nothing happens!

We have been predicting doomsday, millions will die, blah, blah for the last 50 years and no matter how hard we try the planet is still kicking, but fanatical ****wits still live in hope!

[Harte]

29 minutes ago, Piney said:

What about for your moustache? 

Well, okay you got me.

But I use a very tiny blow drier about the size of an acorn.

Have to put my glasses on to find the on switch.

Harte

[Timothy]

25 minutes ago, Harte said:

Well, okay you got me.

But I use a very tiny blow drier about the size of an acorn.

Have to put my glasses on to find the on switch.

Harte

The energy it takes to produce a pair of spectacles is the equivalent of that required to run a Chinese Bitcoin farming operation for a year.

Shame on you! Running the Earth into the... earth.

[Timothy]

@tmcom, of course it caused issues for people. 

But if I relied on electricity to be able to comfortable survive a medical condition, I would have contingencies in place. 

I wouldn’t be replying on the power grid to keep me alive. 

[Tatetopa]

3 hours ago, and then said:

I doubt it.  Those children are the only social welfare system available to them.

Maybe if they reduce infant mortality and childhood diseases.  China did pretty good at that so maybe its possible.  Then that many kids if they survive makes too many to inherit the farm or whatever property the family has.

[+Pettytalk]

3 hours ago, Harte said:

In my own personal nod to conservation, I stopped using a blow drier.

Once most of my hair fell out,

Harte

Did any of your own whistlehead friends make use of your disposable hair?  Recycling is the "natural" way to go.

For those wanting to conserve our once youthful, and energetic looks with a full head of hair, why use synthetic hair (fine plastic fibers) for a toupee or a wig, when recycled human hair is the way to go in these times of energy conservation needs?

And for those that do not want to get in someone's hair, there is still a natural solution...natural horsehair.

[Sir Smoke aLot]

12 hours ago, AllPossible said:

The rich will be fine. In fact most of the rich will be dead by then. People in power now will not be alive when this apocalypse happens so would they even care. Sad greedy world

That really is sad. No one seems to care for future generations, no one who might make a difference. As if the world is all about having more powerful engine in yacht, essentially that's all there is behind pollution.

Imagine if this technological level was achieved like 200+ years ago, well, i assume that we would be surrounded with plastic waste and polluted air. My country is not developed in industry (was better in 1960's lol) but our air is, at times, more polluted than the most developed industry areas in China, it's just crazy.

And what about water? Soon there will be no drop of it without traces of detergents. Reason? Greed, as you say. Mostly greed. People did make national borders but the atmosphere has no physical barriers to save anyone.

[Doug1029]

17 hours ago, Timothy said:

Hi Doug,

Just to offer another Aussie opinion: The blackouts in Victoria in Feb this year were a non-issue for most. Power was deliberately cut to ~200,000 consumers for up to two hours.  

There was a 40°C heat wave at the time, one generator down for scheduled maintenance and two had unplanned outages. 

Yes there was not enough electricity available for demand at the time and the Portland VIC smelter etc. was paid to switch off for a bit, but the system worked as it was meant to and the actual power cuts were planned and deliberate. It’s part of the contingency and allows for this situation to possibly occur once a month. Consumers were advised beforehand and the cuts happened as expected.

Having said that, my power didn’t go off, and the only time in the last ~10 years I’ve experienced blackouts was once at UNI in 2008 or 2009 for bit of an evening. Other than that, just the lights flickering sometimes during local electrical storms etc.

If people wanted to, we could pay in our taxes to build another plant and always have excess power and 100% supply for demand. But it’s not really economical. And people want to spend their $$ on other stuff.

The current system is getting old and will be supplemented as required, but it works and the ‘blackouts’ are not a major issue for the vast majority of people who live here. (‘blackouts’ because it wasn’t as big an issue as @tmcom is making it sound. Most people here wouldn’t really bat an eyelid at what happened.) @tmcom do you have a bit of an aluminium chip on your shoulder or something? You have some strong opinions!

(Also: I’m sure you’re aware, but yes you spell it ‘aluminum’ and we spell it ‘aluminium’, which explains the contrasting verbal pronunciation. )

See you in 2051 at some civilized location!

Thnaks for that much-needed perspective.

Around here (north-central Oklahoma) we get power outages three or four times a year.  Rarely more than an hour or two and nearly always caused by a problem in the transmission lines.  A snake got into a power transformer, fried itself and knocked out power to a neighborhood; a tree branch caused a short that blew out a circuit breaker; or, heavy snow broke some lines.  Since 2001 we have never had an interuption of power caused by a generator failure or wind drought.

Doug

[Doug1029]

16 hours ago, qxcontinuum said:

In Canada and some parts from Eastern Europe the winter of 2018 and 2019 has been one of the longest and the coldest on records. We're in June and temperatures still drop down to 6 degrees C at night. Elders are saying that they have never seen or experienced such long-lasting colder temperatures. 

One of my neighbors is a very famous gardner. A few of his plants have not made flowers in the last 3 years due to cold weather.

I do not see a global warming by contrary i see a cooling down. This planet can easily take 3 Celsius over. The real problem is cutting of the forest and neverending wild life habitat shrink created by supra population.

Meanwhile, what is going on in Peru or Australia?  It's GLOBAL warming, not European warming.  Climate is based on averages.

And, yes, diversion of wild lands to human use, mostly agriculture, is a serious problem.

Doug

[+Desertrat56]

13 hours ago, Tatetopa said:

Yeah.  I thought so.  Pollution does seem like a human caused problem that is a bit more manageable than climate change.    And I agree, you are probably right.  Everything would be a little easier with  fewer people.  I wonder if the China one child policy would ever catch on in countries that average eight because six of them never reach adulthood.

The China one child policy barely caught on in china.  It would never catch on in any religious family that follows the "go forth and multiply" doctrine.  The people who think about it already limit themselves to one child.

[Doug1029]

11 hours ago, pallidin said:

"Doom-and-Gloom" is certainly a somewhat healthy consideration... to a point.

It can help us to get a "grip" on critical issues during each generation.

But to flat-out suggest that the world will end "by such-and-such date or time-frame" is simply ridiculous, overly pessimistic and borderline psychotic.

Recall that, without exception, there have been people's within society from the very dawn of civilization which seem literally obsessed with impending global tragedy.

Yet humanity has survived, and as a whole is doing just fine.

We must always be vigilant of course, and effort to take corrective actions as needed to address the unique challenges of each generation, but to have a set-attitude of imminent fatalism is improper and unhealthy.

It seems to me that doom-and-gloom is pretty-much irrelevant.  We have a problem.  How do we solve it?

I think we will solve the climate problem and do it in a way that most people won't even notice, mostly by innovation.

There is no need to spend huge amounts of tax money on conversion and spending too much too fast can be counter-productive.

Government gets new industries started by doing the basic research, then putting up money to get businesses started.  That happened with electricity (Rural Electric Coops), the space industry (NASA) and is now happening with WTs.

How costly are govt projects?  A grant project I once worked on paid more in taxes than it got through the grant.  The average is about 120% of the original grant.  The project buys supplies (taxable), pays its people (taxable) and they spend that money on items and people that pay taxes.  That is compounded about once a month.  The bleed-off that brings the end figure down to 120% is caused by people paying off debt, like house mortgages, or savings that don't directly affect the economy.  If it is careful on how it spends the money, govt can spend itself rich.  Its called the Modern Monetary Theory and addresses an imperfection in Keynesian economics.

We're going to invent our way out of this problem.  All we have to do is remember what the objective is and not get side-tracked.

Doug

[Doug1029]

11 hours ago, tmcom said:

Build more wind turbines, lol, thanks for the laugh, so we use 150 tonnes of coal, or china does, (with our coal) and create something that will most likely not give it all back to us, so it looks like we are fighting climate change?

It does not take 150 tons of coal to build a WT.  Even in Australia, wind is generating enough energy to cover the costs of new construction.  Your meme is hopelessly obsolete.

Will WTs ever give back the power in 150T of coal? 

US Energy Information Administration.  1998.  Energy information sheets:  "Each ton of coal consumed at an electric power plant produces about 2000 kh of electricty."

WTs currently being installed generate 2.0 kw/h.  It would take about an hour for a newly-installed WT to pay off its energy debt to coal.  You're grasping at straws.

 

11 hours ago, tmcom said:

And what happens when there is no wind, which there usually is for 3 days to a week, several times a year over typically three states in Australia, smelter shutdown and power blackouts!

McVicar, T., T. Van Niel, L. Li, M. Roderick, D. Rayner, L. Ricciarulli and R. Donohue.  2008.  Wind speed climatoilogy and trends for Australia, 1975-2006:  capturing the stilling phenomenon and comparison with near-surface reanalysis output.  Geophysical Research Letters 35(20).  https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2008GL035627  5 June 2019.

New South Wales has 13% wind drought.  Victoria has 10%, the same as Oklahoma's.

That means that a given WT is inactive due to a shortage of wind about 10% of the time.  But other WTs in the same wind farm are still getting wind and generating power.  I have seen this with my own eyes.  On my recent trip to Oregon, I observed a group of 20 WTs.  One was turning at normal speed, generating power.  Three more were idle without enough wind to turn them and 16 more were barely turning, not able to generate power.  This group of 20 was a disjoint part of a wind farm with hundreds of operating windmills.  There was another group of about 100 that were not turning at all - they were shut down because there was no need for the power they would produce.  So even though there was a wind drought at this wind farm, it had no effect at all on the production of power needed to meet demand.

But what if a wind drought occurs during peak demand?  Other WTs in the same farm can still generate enough power to fill demand about 99% of the time.  That's about 3.65 days a year that the wind farm could not put out enough power.  In that case, the grid simply switches to another generator, like another wind farm.  The odds of an entire grid's wind supply all failing at the same time are vanishingly small, less than that of a coal-fired plant suffering a catastrophic breakdown.

Wind failure is a non-issue if your grid taps several different wind farms.

Doug