08-30-2022, 10:06 AM
(This post was last modified: 08-30-2022, 10:29 AM by Eric the Green.)
The reason Germany is using more coal, is because of Putin. This is a temporary condition, at least if Germany and the EU and the USA continue to support Ukraine and turn back the monster invader. It has to be done. Russia has cut off the gas supply on which Germany was too dependent. That was the mistake. But Germany is now ramping up renewables development too. It has a huge new wind farm being built in the Baltic. Maybe Germany will delay closing nuclear plants, but it doesn't seem to have uranium supplies right now to do that. France I believe is going back to more nuclear right now. Cutting off Russian gas needed to be done anyway as part of the sanctions regime. This gas shutoff was not a deliberate result of cutting it off in order to move away from fossil fuels. It happened because Germany is stepping up and doing its part to turn back the barbarian invader. It HAS to be done! And by the way, the Russians need to be forced to produce less gas anyway.
This goes along with your point. Transition is not an overnight project, and it takes time to build the alternatives. Catastrophes like the invasion of a democratic country by a rapacious tyrannical neighbor happen, and have to be handled. Droughts, themselves caused by climate change and fossil fuel use, can cut off hydro energy we already had too, like is happening in CA. So CA may delay closing a nuclear plant and restart some gas generators for a while. But if we were as dedicated to this energy transition as we are to complaining about high gas prices and blaming Biden for it, and even blaming inflation on him because of the bipartisan money spent to help people through the pandemic shutdowns, then we could get it done much faster than we are doing it.
And The West promised to actually help developing countries deal with the climate crisis, which poor countries suffer the most from and did the least to cause, but have not fulfilled this commitment. We in the West need to be more than just be an example and to preach. We need to fulfill our promises and get a Marshall Plan-like effort going to provide the world with renewable clean energy, and we need to give them aid when floods and heat waves and droughts wipe them out, since The West caused this problem for them in the first place.
https://youtu.be/HvD0TgE34HA?t=1800
This goes along with your point. Transition is not an overnight project, and it takes time to build the alternatives. Catastrophes like the invasion of a democratic country by a rapacious tyrannical neighbor happen, and have to be handled. Droughts, themselves caused by climate change and fossil fuel use, can cut off hydro energy we already had too, like is happening in CA. So CA may delay closing a nuclear plant and restart some gas generators for a while. But if we were as dedicated to this energy transition as we are to complaining about high gas prices and blaming Biden for it, and even blaming inflation on him because of the bipartisan money spent to help people through the pandemic shutdowns, then we could get it done much faster than we are doing it.
And The West promised to actually help developing countries deal with the climate crisis, which poor countries suffer the most from and did the least to cause, but have not fulfilled this commitment. We in the West need to be more than just be an example and to preach. We need to fulfill our promises and get a Marshall Plan-like effort going to provide the world with renewable clean energy, and we need to give them aid when floods and heat waves and droughts wipe them out, since The West caused this problem for them in the first place.
https://youtu.be/HvD0TgE34HA?t=1800