Why was Didcot "A" Power Station Demolished a Columnist Asks?

I was accused of being  in denial of climate change a few weeks ago.


The was a news report about Fairbourne In Wales being at increased risk of flooding due to climate change.


I said the government and council just don’t want to maintain the flood defences around land reclaimed from the sea, but the sea is rising due to climate change I was told, at which point I said there is a 5000 year old Submerged forest  just down the coast at Borth and that the sea has been rising or the land has been dropping for at least those 5000 years, indeed the are tales of there being a Welsh Alantis  more reclaimed land that was lost when the sea gates were left open.


There is a natural rhythm to things that are beyond the influence of mankind and not every change in climate and sea level can be attributed pollution and the like, but generally mankind’s activities are creating huge environmental issues so things staying as they are is not an option.


Andy Betteridge

Indeed, and what do the media prompt the viewers and listeners to think as soon as they broadcast news of a river raging through a town centre after a storm?

"Ah! That'll be due to climate change!".

Never mind the fact that former green field sites have been concreted over, many on natural flood plains - to provide out of town shopping centres, new housing estates et al!

Just WHERE ELSE do they expect excess ground water to go?

But then again, facts such as these do not suit the present narrative do they?.

That depends on your "present narrative".  The problems of surface run-off from hard paving are becoming increasingly clear.  That's why new driveways should not simply dump run-off into the road.  they should be porous or have a soakaway (and not go into the public drains, either).


But there is so much pressure to build houses, that they still get built on floodplains, however many times those in charge say they shouldn't be.

So, the hard of thinking mob are demanding:

"Government must create and be led by the decisions of a Citizens’ Assembly"


A look in the history books might suggest they missed the section on Robespierre and the Committee on Public Safety


Reasonable protest is fine in my book - the hard core embedded in ER are a danger to all right minded thinking individuals. If we follow the logic through we are suggesting condemning about 90% of the world population to zero growth - so if currently your dad grubs about on a subsistence basis, that that's going to be your lot, and the same for your children and grandchildren. Unpalatable at the facts may be, in my view we don't necessarily have a climate emergency, more of a population emergency - google for the population projection figures and the economic growth figures for Zambia as an example


Regards


OMS

Interesting debate.

I have some questions, probably inspired by me trying to balance a cash account.


1. What is the net Earth balance of O2 verses CO2?

2. How much CO2 is exhaled per year by 7 Billion Humans plus unknown multitude of animals?

3. How much CO2 is produced by man mad industrial adventures?

4. What about the total Methane (CH4) emissions caused from anaerobic decomposition in (a) natural wetlands; (b) paddy rice fields; (c) emission from livestock production systems (including intrinsic fermentation and animal waste); (d) biomass burning (including forest fires, charcoal combustion, and firewood ?


Oh dear does this suggest a possible gradual side into euthanasia and eugenics?


Legh

at which point I said there is a 5000 year old Submerged forest  just down the coast at Borth and that the sea has been rising or the land has been dropping for at least those 5000 years, indeed the are tales of there being a Welsh Alantis  more reclaimed land that was lost when the sea gates were left open.

I agree with the submerged forest etc (some of my younger years were spent in West Wales so I'm very familiar with the accounts of Cantre'r Gwaelod  and so on) - but I suspect that the conclusion that the sea in the area has been continuously rising or the land dropping for those 5000 (or whatever) years  might not be correct. If I recall my O-level geography field trips (a little further down the coast at Pwll Du if my dim memory serves) when we studied amongst other things wave-cut platforms - the explanation was that they persisted because the land was currently rising (or the sea falling) at a similar rate to the erosion of the rocks by the waves - and the explanation we were offered for that is that the entire British Isles are still slowly returning to equlibrium after the last ice age dumped billions of tons of ice predominantly to the north/west and so caused the West and North coasts to sink and the South and East coasts to rise. Once the ice melted things (very slowly) started to return to normal - so we now see the South & East coasts generally sinking and the West and North rising - to which any changes in absolute sea level would have to be added of course. Of course the absolute sea level would have been very significantly lower during ice ages (which probably accounts for 'drowned city' legends from many parts of the world, not just Wales) and would then have returned to "normal" quite rapidly at the end of the ice age. To assume that things must have followed a 'straight line' from the days of Seithennyn to now, I fear might be an over-simplification.

  - Andy.

I not trying to say there has been a gentle movement, just that there is a natural rhythm which is beyond the influence of mankind.

Locally the highest recorded flood level on the River Severn was in 1795 so again before the industrial revolution got into full gear, however since then two areas of flood plain have been used a rubbish dumps raising them far above their original level and the run off from the West Midlands conurbation has increased significantly.


However any present day flood reaching anything like that level will almost certainly be blamed on global warming.


I am all for reducing emissions and so on, but not every environmental blip is due to the way we live.


 Andy Betteridge

I am somewhat sceptical, but I haven't taken the trouble to read the primary scientific sources.


What bugs me is the argument that we cannot afford to get it wrong, so we must assume worst case scenario.


I agree with others above that one of the worst, if not the worst problem, is the growth in the population.