Technology, Science and the Environment.

[Leicester_Loyal]

 

@leicsmac  Way above my pay-grade, thoughts and opinions on this please when you get a spare 5 minutes. 

[leicsmac]

58 minutes ago, Leicester_Loyal said:

 

@leicsmac  Way above my pay-grade, thoughts and opinions on this please when you get a spare 5 minutes. 

I have a few observations.

 

Firstly, this needs the attention of a good fact-checker (or several) to be verified as truthful information at all.

 

Secondly, while it's possible what is being said here is on the level, this guy is pretty much Rodgers saying that the squad he has isn't good enough: quite probably true but not anywhere close to the full story or considering all the elements in the equation. Without a similar analysis of gas, oil and coal extraction and combustion and what they cost similarly, these observations are one-sided and therefore of much less value to the overall debate. If the man is making the argument that somehow fossil fuels are better environmentally than renewable options, then he needs to make the comparison rather than just looking at one side.

 

Finally, as such methods advance, developing solar panels, wind turbines, storage cells and other such tech will become "cleaner" anyway. Additionally, there is a wealth of the metals the man mentions that could become available to us once asteroid meining becomes a thing (and it will, given a few decades).

 

It's a shame that this rather malinformative hit piece has garnered such attention the comments are full of people satisfying their own confirmation bias by going along with it and by extension believing the status quo is going to be anything but disastrous if it continues. It is a critique that may be accurate but actually adds precious little because it offers no better alternatives, nor reasoning as to why those alternatives would be better.

[LiberalFox]

It's nonsense. 

[SpacedX]

5 hours ago, Leicester_Loyal said:

 

@leicsmac  Way above my pay-grade, thoughts and opinions on this please when you get a spare 5 minutes. 

What Mac said.

 

Oh, and his name's taken from a Steve Earle song (Copperhead Road).

[LiberalFox]

Actually I take that back. If he truly is a miner then it may be correct that he worked in mines. The rest is nonsense. 

[leicsmac]

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-64039146

 

There is a new order emerging in space - a race between America and China. But with the demands of space exploration, even these great superpowers won't be able to do it alone.

Hugely technically challenging and costly goals have been touted, not least the aim of people living and working on other worlds, possibly within ten years - but in a divided world where international good will is scarce, are they realistic?

 

A reasonably comprehensive look at the state of play right now. Personally, I'm hoping for more cooperation and less Cold War dick swinging competition.

Edited 17 January 2023 by leicsmac

[Jon the Hat]

On 16/01/2023 at 02:34, LiberalFox said:

It's nonsense. 

After a little over a year in a senior role in a major global OEM to the mining industry I have learned a little about this.  He has oversimplified some issues and exaggerated others, but there are some valid points in here that the mining industry and its suppliers (including my employer) need to work on (and are starting to do so).  These are not however a reason to change direction on green energy (which I guess is his intent), more a list of must haves to do so in an efficient and effective way.  Like all other change it doesn't happen the right way unless we choose to make it so.

 

Volumes of critical minerals need to increase hugely in the energy transition, and yes this means digging up and crushing, grinding, separating and filtering a lot of rock to get to the refined ore, and then refining that ore into the metals you want, as well as dealing with the tailings.  We can choose how we want to operate in each of these steps of the process - although the technology also takes time to develop and some of them remain very messy and energy / water intensive.  I would say all of the major miners are heavily invested in improving how they operate to varying degrees as are their equipment suppliers.  The good news is that they are under pressure from the public, governments, investors, banks and customers to improve.  However as ever this applies well in Western economies and less so in China, Russia etc. which is an issue given the huge investment in mining happening with Chinese backing.

 

Moving to be able to run mining equipment on electricity effectively (probably 4% of world energy use is here), and to massively reduce water waste and improve tailings management are each very important.  Minimizing environment and social impacts just as much so.  We can do it though, and we have to.

[leicsmac]

https://phys.org/news/2023-01-climate-scientists-humans-blame.html

 

"Fungi cannot survive if it's hosts internal temperature is over 94 degrees (Fahrenheit), and currently there are no reasons for fungi to evolve to withstand higher temperatures.

 

But...what if that were to change? What if, for instance...the world were to get slightly warmer?" - Dr Neuman. The Last of Us, episode 1.

Edited 17 January 2023 by leicsmac

[leicsmac]

https://phys.org/news/2023-01-reveals-key-fake-news-social.html

 

"USC researchers may have found the biggest influencer in the spread of fake news: social platforms' structure of rewarding users for habitually sharing information.

 

The team's findings, published Tuesday by Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, upend popular misconceptions that misinformation spreads because users lack the critical thinking skills necessary for discerning truth from falsehood or because their strong political beliefs skew their judgment.

 

Just 15% of the most habitual news sharers in the research were responsible for spreading about 30% to 40% of the fake news..."

 

It comes back to the clicks, and therefore the ad revenue, and therefore the money. It almost always does.

 

"...you know Burke, I don't know which species is worse. You don't see them fvcking each other over for a goddamn percentage."

[SpacedX]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-64321824

 

[leicsmac]

Some space news:

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-64346185

 

It's a shame we won't see Major Tim take flight into space again, but we need good science communicators and he's one of the best.

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-64336398

 

Confirming liquid water on Europa would be massive. Here's hoping for success.

 

NB. I happened to know Professor Bunce when I studied at the UoL, it's great that she's a key part of this project.

[ozleicester]

 

Top of Everest

[leicsmac]

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-64440827

 

Yes, it makes economic sense too.

[yorkie1999]

On 21/01/2023 at 07:58, ozleicester said:

 

Top of Everest

Very picturesque

[leicsmac]

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-64544110

 

Oh hey, they're lying profiteers who place short term profit over human future.

 

I for one am shocked.

[grobyfox1990]

28 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-64544110

 

Oh hey, they're lying profiteers who place short term profit over human future.

 

I for one am shocked.

They lie for a whole host of reasons I am sure but it's harsh to say they are lying on this. The market has placed emphasis on credible transition plans, with monitoring in place. A huge company like BP won't have been able to get a 40-50% SBT through it's disclosure unless credible, and will be probably be reducing to 20-30% because they haven't done they work required to stick to the original plan. Laziness over lies.

[leicsmac]

46 minutes ago, grobyfox1990 said:

They lie for a whole host of reasons I am sure but it's harsh to say they are lying on this. The market has placed emphasis on credible transition plans, with monitoring in place. A huge company like BP won't have been able to get a 40-50% SBT through it's disclosure unless credible, and will be probably be reducing to 20-30% because they haven't done they work required to stick to the original plan. Laziness over lies.

Hanlons Razor applying then? "Do not attribute to malice that which first can be explained by incompetence".

 

It's possible, certainly. However, in this case I would also suggest Greys Law applies: "Any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice."

 

There's not an awful lot of future difference in terms of consequences between them doing this for the sake of malicious profiteering and then being lazy. Therefore, the response to them doing it should be the same IMO.

 

 

[grobyfox1990]

3 hours ago, leicsmac said:

Hanlons Razor applying then? "Do not attribute to malice that which first can be explained by incompetence".

 

It's possible, certainly. However, in this case I would also suggest Greys Law applies: "Any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice."

 

There's not an awful lot of future difference in terms of consequences between them doing this for the sake of malicious profiteering and then being lazy. Therefore, the response to them doing it should be the same IMO.

 

 

No idea about the two theories you mention, they sound cool but not sure they are applicable here. BP are one of the biggest companies on the planet, the market will be scrutinising their transition plans very closely, because incorrect transition plans cost money. Climate predictions are constantly changing. A credible SBT of 40% reduction can soon be reduced to 20-30% just because we now know more. 

 

Not saying that is what happened here with certainty, but there is no way a major like BP can 'lie' about a disclosed SBT these days, the market is too advanced.

 

Yeh, in conclusion, it's all gravy anyway, because we all suffer

[leicsmac]

2 minutes ago, grobyfox1990 said:

No idea about the two theories you mention, they sound cool but not sure they are applicable here. BP are one of the biggest companies on the planet, the market will be scrutinising their transition plans very closely, because incorrect transition plans cost money. Climate predictions are constantly changing. A credible SBT of 40% reduction can soon be reduced to 20-30% just because we now know more. 

 

Not saying that is what happened here with certainty, but there is no way a major like BP can 'lie' about a disclosed SBT these days, the market is too advanced.

 

Yeh, in conclusion, it's all gravy anyway, because we all suffer

I think the "market", as accurate as it is for judging short term trends and actions and how they should be applied, is sadly lacking when it comes to this particular matter that requires a response that extends over decades.

 

It is probably true to say that they didn't "lie" as such on this one, but it's reasonably obvious to me that they have reneged on a previous position for no good reason without anywhere near justifiable cause for doing so - either through incompetence at getting it done, misjudgement on their role in what needs to be done, or simple short term self interest because they don't really care (for whatever reason) about the long term. Or a mix of these.

 

And yes, any and all of these reasons add up to the same consequence anyway, so I'm going to treat them equally dimly and with equal annoyance.

[grobyfox1990]

19 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

I think the "market", as accurate as it is for judging short term trends and actions and how they should be applied, is sadly lacking when it comes to this particular matter that requires a response that extends over decades.

 

It is probably true to say that they didn't "lie" as such on this one, but it's reasonably obvious to me that they have reneged on a previous position for no good reason without anywhere near justifiable cause for doing so - either through incompetence at getting it done, misjudgement on their role in what needs to be done, or simple short term self interest because they don't really care (for whatever reason) about the long term. Or a mix of these.

 

And yes, any and all of these reasons add up to the same consequence anyway, so I'm going to treat them equally dimly and with equal annoyance.

Not strictly true. Because of SFDR and incoming SDR the market is the best judge of long-term risk, because it’s the only way you’re going to make long-term money. 
 

I think you’ve misunderstood my earlier point, they’ve not ‘reneged’ as far as I can tell here, they’ve changed an SBT. And that happens often for a variety of reasons. Without reading the actual disclosure rather than the populist and very basic bbc article, it’s hard to know why. Anyway I don’t want to come across like the poster who always defends blatant and obvious corporate excess, but this isn’t as easy a case as ‘shell make £90000bn profit and pay £7.56 uk tax’

[leicsmac]

8 hours ago, grobyfox1990 said:

Not strictly true. Because of SFDR and incoming SDR the market is the best judge of long-term risk, because it’s the only way you’re going to make long-term money. 
 

I think you’ve misunderstood my earlier point, they’ve not ‘reneged’ as far as I can tell here, they’ve changed an SBT. And that happens often for a variety of reasons. Without reading the actual disclosure rather than the populist and very basic bbc article, it’s hard to know why. Anyway I don’t want to come across like the poster who always defends blatant and obvious corporate excess, but this isn’t as easy a case as ‘shell make £90000bn profit and pay £7.56 uk tax’

...are there any working examples of either of these mechanisms resulting in good things happening environmentally over the long term without government intervention? Genuine question.

 

Yes, they've changed an SBT. They've done so for reasons that are unclear, but in a way that in all likelihood will be negative for long-term environmental future. Until there is clear and convincing evidence to the contrary, because of those implied consequneces the null hypothesis has to be that they did so for reasons that are either borne from incompetence, malice, or both. I don't think "reneging" on a deal is the wrong term to be using here, as such.

[Jon the Hat]

11 hours ago, grobyfox1990 said:

Not strictly true. Because of SFDR and incoming SDR the market is the best judge of long-term risk, because it’s the only way you’re going to make long-term money. 
 

I think you’ve misunderstood my earlier point, they’ve not ‘reneged’ as far as I can tell here, they’ve changed an SBT. And that happens often for a variety of reasons. Without reading the actual disclosure rather than the populist and very basic bbc article, it’s hard to know why. Anyway I don’t want to come across like the poster who always defends blatant and obvious corporate excess, but this isn’t as easy a case as ‘shell make £90000bn profit and pay £7.56 uk tax’

Those cases are never that simple either.  BP this week announced what look like large profits, but they actually made a loss due to exiting Russian business, and still paid a high rate of tax on the profitable bit.  As I said with Shell, if you want to tax the good times, you have to also be prepared to share the pain when it is painful, otherwise instead of sharing the wealth you are just ****ing over companies and their shareholders / pensioners.

[leicsmac]

47 minutes ago, Jon the Hat said:

Those cases are never that simple either.  BP this week announced what look like large profits, but they actually made a loss due to exiting Russian business, and still paid a high rate of tax on the profitable bit.  As I said with Shell, if you want to tax the good times, you have to also be prepared to share the pain when it is painful, otherwise instead of sharing the wealth you are just ****ing over companies and their shareholders / pensioners.

Certainly, that's fair.

 

Still looking for examples where the "invisible hand" has shown positive demonstrable and intended consequences over the long term period of time it would take to address this particular issue and others, though.

[grobyfox1990]

6 hours ago, leicsmac said:

...are there any working examples of either of these mechanisms resulting in good things happening environmentally over the long term without government intervention? Genuine question.

 

Yes, they've changed an SBT. They've done so for reasons that are unclear, but in a way that in all likelihood will be negative for long-term environmental future. Until there is clear and convincing evidence to the contrary, because of those implied consequneces the null hypothesis has to be that they did so for reasons that are either borne from incompetence, malice, or both. I don't think "reneging" on a deal is the wrong term to be using here, as such.

No, because it’s not the long-term yet. But there are many examples of the market uncovering bluster from companies and ensuring they disclose accurate and achievable aims, see the example of BP. And then punishing them for it. They haven’t reneged on a deal because the target could well change by next year. 
 

Governments cannot intervene on these issues, because they don’t understand them. 

[grobyfox1990]

3 hours ago, Jon the Hat said:

Those cases are never that simple either.  BP this week announced what look like large profits, but they actually made a loss due to exiting Russian business, and still paid a high rate of tax on the profitable bit.  As I said with Shell, if you want to tax the good times, you have to also be prepared to share the pain when it is painful, otherwise instead of sharing the wealth you are just ****ing over companies and their shareholders / pensioners.

So they’ve reported a loss in this period due to that previous money printing Rosneft JV and STILL reported overall bumper profits. Jesus…. Not sure why governments should have to share the bad times, when bad times arrive overwhelmingly due to poor management. Shell should look after their stakeholders, not expect the govt to, moral hazard that’s presumably got us into this mess. The example of how well JP Morgan is run during all the volatility dismisses the ‘there’s nothing I can do about it’ argument