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Off Topic The Environmental & Pollution Thread

Discussion in 'Southampton' started by TheSecondStain, Jan 12, 2020.

  1. saintrichie123

    saintrichie123 Well-Known Member

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    There’s too many in queues now filling with petrol/diesel...and that only takes a few minutes.
    But if this new design works and is financially viable....this might be a game changer.
    https://www.theguardian.com/environ...es-race-ahead-with-five-minute-charging-times
     
    #641
  2. Kaito

    Kaito Well-Known Member

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    I have travelled in and driven a number of hydrogen vehicles when in Japan and they are brilliant. Unlike electric vehicles, which are inconvenient to charge and for some people represent a financial and logistical step too far, hydrogen could replace petrol and diesel cars, vans and trucks if the political will was there. The problem with electric cars is that many people just will not have ready access to the charging systems and therefore a whole section of the population are yet again marginalised because of poorly though out policies.

    In the last couple of years the availability of public fast charging points has only increased very slowly and nothing like the rate required to make distance travel stress free. Local travel is fine if you have the ability to charge a car at home and you can afford the price premium of an electric car but a huge percentage of the population can't do either. Also, the technology is evolving quite rapidly and who really is going to invest in a very expensive electric car when the resale value could well fall through the floor in a very short space of time? Not me thanks very much, but I wouldn't criticise those who have bought one.

    It would be far better for the environment if all governments first of all invested in sustainable, frequent and affordable public transport that is available to everyone, no matter what their personal circumstances are. That would not only be the fairest way to reduce pollution but it would also help to bring some more equality to a society that is becoming more and more self centred.
     
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    Last edited: Apr 10, 2021
  3. fatletiss

    fatletiss Well-Known Member

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    Supermarket parking spaces with charging points. Charge while you shop.... unless you are just popping in for some “Just for Men” my cherry blossom friend :)
     
    #643
  4. davecg69

    davecg69 Well-Known Member

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    If you park in the East Street car park in Southampton there are at least 8 charge points there. I noticed them when I was there last year and thought it was a good idea
     
    #644
  5. fatletiss

    fatletiss Well-Known Member

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    That’s all well and good Dave but I’d probably run out of charge by the time I was 3/4s of the way back to northampton :emoticon-0136-giggl
     
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  6. thereisonlyoneno7

    thereisonlyoneno7 Well-Known Member

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    Already noted all Tesco near us have charge points :)

    At the moment they seem quite empty but in a year or two maybe not
     
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    Last edited: Apr 10, 2021
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  7. davecg69

    davecg69 Well-Known Member

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    Depends - the new MG5 estate does over 200 miles on a full charge - drive sensibly with maximum KERS and you’d make it easy .....
     
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  8. shoot_spiderman

    shoot_spiderman Power to the People

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    #648
    Last edited: Apr 11, 2021
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  9. Schrodinger's Cat

    Schrodinger's Cat Well-Known Member

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    I agree we need more public transport, but rural areas will always need independently owned vehicles IMHO because it would be ludicrous expensive to implement enough alternatives to allow people to give up cars. I'd have to start work at 10.30am if I tried to get to work by bus rather than 8am so that wouldn't work.
    We're still 5 years away from having a railway station near Devizes, but when that happens it opens up the possibility of commuting to Bath and further afield...we shall see.

    I'm going to keep my Renault Zoe until it won't hold enough useful charge any more, and then I'll get the battery taken out and use it for domestic storage as it'll still be useful for that. Could get 15 - 20 years use from a car battery if they are then repurposed, which helps a bit towards the high environmental cost of associated mining activities.
    I think the answer is hydrogen fuel cells, but the cost to produce and store liquid H needs to come down, and they use platinum as a catalyst which must have an environmental cost
     
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  10. shoot_spiderman

    shoot_spiderman Power to the People

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    Obviously not suggesting we aim for no cars at all and personal transport will be needed but a huge amount could be reduced
    However, it seems you're saying if you had a railway station nearby you could go by train
    Another solution is people living nearer their jobs
    These solutions aren't quick
     
    #650
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  11. Schrodinger's Cat

    Schrodinger's Cat Well-Known Member

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    If everyone lived near their jobs, there'd be nobody left in a lot of rural areas.
    And yes, I was saying that I could go by train if we had a connection, but it would still be double my current commute time and probably much too expensive. I'd also need to cycle 5 miles to the station and back or rely on a bus to get there.
    No easy answers, and the reality is that the required changes to our way of life here in the west is going to cost far more than most people are willing to give, so it's going to have to be forced through by governments at some point.
    We can't get people to wear masks for 5 minutes without setting fire to things so can you imagine the protests when our whole way of life is restricted due to carbon reduction measures?
     
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  12. Kaito

    Kaito Well-Known Member

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    Striking a balance between personal transport and public transport is what is needed because some folk do need access to a car at times but could live with efficient public transport most of the time. I am one of them. If there was a very efficient car rental system that was readily available and charged by the hour I could manage with that, along with good public transport. Neither exist round here so I have a car and it spends most of its life sat in the drive. It's a waste of money and environmentally selfish but I can't manage without it unless I give up the allotment and visiting friends. Living like a hermit doesn't really do it for me so it is what it is.

    I think it will have to come down to government legislation to bring about change but it isn't going to happen, mainly because of the resistance to such a move. We end up with blind alleys like electric cars without a comprehensive charging infrastructure available to all, and a whole host of bullshit 'environmental incentives' that rarely last very long.

    To be honest, the human race is heading for a disaster of apocalyptic proportions because we wont give up what we have for the sake of securing the future for our own children and grandchildren. In fact it's worse than that. Not only will we not change, we are increasingly raping and pillaging the planet at an ever increasing rate to produce even more junk we really don't need. We are told by the marketing men we must have it, and being so ****ing stupid we just go right ahead and grab it to satisfy the basic human condition so many of us suffer from ..... greed.
     
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  13. davecg69

    davecg69 Well-Known Member

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    2/3 of the world’s platinum comes from South Africa. When I worked out there, the Chinese came in and basically bought all the mines. So .... between China and Russia, they own probably 80% ....
    I’m hoping for new battery technology rather than hydrogen to be honest .....
     
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  14. davecg69

    davecg69 Well-Known Member

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    Sadly, you are so correct. The economists and governments tell us that “growth” is the way forward to show how countries improve .....
    However, you cannot have “growth” off a finite resource, so .......
    It will take brave governments and people to stand up and say “enough” - unfortunately, I don’t see many of them and fear for the future for my grandchildren and their children. I won’t be here to see it, but I don’t know where it’s going to end
     
    #654
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  15. chinasaint

    chinasaint Well-Known Member

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    #655
  16. fatletiss

    fatletiss Well-Known Member

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    couldn’t read that without having the CGTN app.

    any chance you could copy and paste please?
     
    #656
  17. davecg69

    davecg69 Well-Known Member

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    The Japanese government recently decided to discharge the wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear power plant into the sea, Nikkei Asia said on April 9. The resolution is scheduled to be formally confirmed at a cabinet meeting on April 13.

    Since last year, the issue of nuclear wastewater discharge has become a hot topic. According to the cabinet, the storage tanks for wastewater are expected to reach the upper limit by autumn 2022. In late October last year, the Japanese government said it would gradually discharge wastewater into the sea. The news was immediately protested by the people of Japan and the world. Under pressure, the Japanese government has yet to implement the plan. But this time, it seems that Japan is really going to do it.

    Many experts pointed out that once the radioactive materials such as tritium in the spent nuclear water are discharged into the sea, they will accompany the ocean current and pollute many parts of the world. What's more, there are other lethal radioactive substances in the wastewater, which Japan has been deliberately concealing.

    On April 4, 2011, TEPCO discharged 11,500 tons of wastewater into the sea. The company said it had filtered it to remove strontium, cesium and other high-level radioactive substances, leaving only tritium which is difficult to remove. However, in 2018, when some experts studied the nuclear wastewater in 2017, they found that not only tritium, but also a large number of radioactive substances such as carbon 14, cobalt 60 and strontium 90 remained in the treated wastewater. Obviously, TEPCO is lying.

    Under the action of ocean current, the radioactive substances in the wastewater will rapidly spread to the whole Pacific Ocean and even the whole world. At the beginning of the incident in 2011, TEPCO discharged the first batch of waste water into the sea. Within a month, radioactivity was detected throughout the Pacific Ocean. The harm of radioactive substances in nuclear waste water to human body is undoubtedly huge.

    Even if a small amount of radionuclide enters the body, it will be enriched in the body and bring great harm to health. Greenpeace's report "Stemming the tide 2020: The reality of the Fukushima radioactive water crisis" published on October 23 alleges that radioactive substances in Fukushima nuclear waste water "may damage human DNA."

    About 1.24 million tons of nuclear wastewater is expected to be discharged this time, and it will take 30 years to complete. The impact on the ocean and even the whole human ecological environment will be immeasurable.

    Environmentalists in Japan and around the world have been opposed to discharging Fukushima nuclear wastewater into the sea. Japan's domestic fishery groups also said that if wastewater is discharged, consumers will refuse to buy aquatic products from Fukushima.

    In June 2020, human rights experts of the United Nations also publicly stated that nuclear wastewater treatment would have a lasting and profound impact on mankind and the earth for several generations, affecting the livelihood of local fishermen in Japan and the human rights of people of other nationalities outside Japan. However, the Japanese government still goes its own way and ignores the voice of the international community.

    In fact, in addition to discharging into the sea, there are other ways to treat nuclear wastewater, such as discharging into the atmosphere after evaporation and burying underground. The most direct way is to build new water storage tanks in the nuclear power plant. It is reported that a number of nuclear power companies have submitted proposals for tritium removal technology to relevant Japanese departments before.

    But it was rejected by Japan. Analysts pointed out that in the view of the Japanese government, other ways are time-consuming, laborious and expensive, and only discharging into the sea is the most cost-effective way.

    On the whole, the problem of nuclear wastewater should not be taken lightly. If we act rashly, it will certainly affect the ecological environment and human survival in Japan and the world. Those Japanese government officials who made the decision to discharge waste water may become the culprits of history.
     
    #657
  18. fatletiss

    fatletiss Well-Known Member

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    Thanks Dave.

    Doesn’t sound too good that.
     
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  19. davecg69

    davecg69 Well-Known Member

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    No. Exactly. Sounds bloody awful - thanks, Chinasaint, for posting. It’s a massive worry, but will anyone take notice?
     
    #659
  20. fatletiss

    fatletiss Well-Known Member

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    I do wonder where we are heading over the next (relatively) short number of years.

    A supposed future power source having an issue with by product disposal.
    Too much plastic in the ocean.
    Ban plastic = revert to higher carbon generating alternatives (the other good alternatives nowhere near ready or plentiful enough yet), means bad for the planet.
    Seaspiracy tells us not to eat fish - all the sustainable methods aren’t really being used sustainably, plus the fish are full of bad stuff anyway (allegedly).
    Don’t eat meat it’s bad for the environment.
    Don’t drive fossil fuel cars - electric car production has higher carbon generation/battery resource not fully available/how to dispose of end of life product.

    Are we heading to a position where we have to reduce population increase?
    Is it too late to reverse?

    Lots of questions and it seems lots of change needed.
     
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