help us by a power station !!

[joethedrummer]

I know the A12 corridor well, I can remember it from the seventies when you had Chelmsford, Boreham, Hatfield Peveral, Witham, Kelvedon, Marks Tey and then Colchester but I went North thirty years later and by then all those places were merging as huge housing estates just joined them together and traffic conjestion was just ramping up. My commute changed from thirty five minutes to an hour and fifteen minutes, thousands more houses on the cards and for me enough was enough so got out.

In fact going further back to when living in Hornchurch as a kid we often visited Colchester zoo before the A12 was even built!

Now living up north I am now witnessing the same destruction as down south, once freindly small towns are just being swamped by housing development and their character ripped out forever, one local town that was once a desirable place to live and with property in demand has become just an urban ghetto where kids that have nothing to do just cause trouble, traffic queues throught the high street because the roads were never layed out with cars in mind and people have long commutes because there is no local work that pays a decent wage. Up here it is agriculture and farming, either livestock or holiday makers.

,, the A12 corridor,, that makes you a clever Ex Local,,

 

[Spectric]

the A12 corridor,, that makes you a clever Ex Local

Nothing clever, just too much pressure to remain having seen better days!

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Maybe it's a particular problem with what is, in effect, a two party system.

I suspect it is, or at least it's worse.

 

[Droogs]

So what percentage do you think you are saving with your Ripple ownership?

I can't afford to invest right now too low an income to put anything back to do so, but more info about how long for payback etc below:

 

[Jonm]

Now living up north I am now witnessing the same destruction as down south, once freindly small towns are just being swamped by housing development and their character ripped out forever

I think that is now called “levelling up”.

 

[Jacob]

The political diatribe isn't unexpected, but I was referring to all Parties' inertia.
Good government consisted in doing as little as possible? Perfectly logical and sensible in my book.

Forgot to add - it's always a pleasure to explain to a trad conservative what it really stands for (doing as little as possible) as they are often taken by surprise!
If in doubt Lord Salisbury expands at great lengths here: Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury - Wikiquote
Brought further up to date, but with a harder edge (less noblesse oblige) by The Salisbury Review as edited by Roger Scruton until recently.

 

[Spectric]

I think that is now called “levelling up”.

Yes another wonderful idea by the party of parties that can produce a lot of hot air and not much else, don't blame Borris long covid can have that effect.

This is a case of you cannot pick and choose, if you want to be like the south east and have more wealth then you must also take all the shiete that comes with it such as pollution, overcrowding and decimation of anything green that must be built on. I personally having experienced that rat race would not wish it upon anyone but once they realise that up north it will be too late.

 

[John Brown]

I can't afford to invest right now too low an income to put anything back to do so, but more info about how long for payback etc below:

I love this idea, but I can't see myself investing with a 14 year payback period. Maybe if I were 20 years younger.

 

[Woodmatt]

I can't afford to invest right now too low an income to put anything back to do so, but more info about how long for payback etc below:

Thanks Droogs,very interesting,will be investigating further

 

[gmgmgm]

I can't afford to invest right now too low an income to put anything back to do so, but more info about how long for payback etc below:

I suspect an IFA would advise you to steer well clear.

If you really want to 'invest' in solar, then there are existing options such as BSIF (Bluefield solar, not a recommendation, but it's been around for many years) and then you can put the dividends against your electricity bill. And it's liquid, so you can sell if you want to. There are probably wind equivalents.

 

[MARK.B.]

Have just seen on the news that scientists in the UK have made a small but important advance in fusion energy , of course it is only a small step but in years to come it could very well be the answer to many of our energy needs , and with only a small amount of radiation (compared to fission power) that has a much shorter half life ,it should be better than anything out there( not including green sources) in terms of pollution. Thinking positively, given time my Grand children may reap the rewards that this will bring

 

[Henniep]

A growing population worldwide is a part of the problem but if we look at population statistics the population is slowly scrinking in pretty much every country that has democracy and rights and education for women as well as tax financed care for the old.
Women who have education and the freedom to decide for themselves and who can rely on the taxpayers to give them care in their old age if their childrendon't do it tend to give birth to around two children per woman on average. As some femele children don't reach reproductive age this results in a slowly schrinking population.
Unless there is a population surplus from elsewhere pouring in.

In other words. If we want the wold population to schrink in a slow and controlled manner without any unnecsessary suffering we should work hard to improve momen's rights and to provide education to women in Africa and India and the Middle East.

A word of caution about broadbrushing the right for women in Africa. There are 54 independant countries in Africa. Many of these countries have provided education for women for decades, and have groundbreaking successes in embracing women's rights. Many of these countries have women cabinet ministers and, in a few cases, leaders of the country. Just another perspective from a fellow African.

 

[DrPhill]

A growing population worldwide is a part of the problem

But not as much a part as some would have you believe.... the part of the earth's population that is expanding is generally the poorer part, and that is the part consuming far less than half the carbon.

New research by Oxfam and the Stockholm Environment Institute
(SEI) reveals the extreme carbon inequality in recent decades that
has driven the world to the climate brink. From 1990 to 2015, a
critical period in which annual emissions grew 60% and cumulative
emissions doubled, we estimate that:
• The richest 10% of the world’s population (c.630 million people)
were responsible for 52% of the cumulative carbon emissions –
depleting the global carbon budget by nearly a third (31%) in
those 25 years alone (see Figure 1);
• The poorest 50% (c.3.1 billion people) were responsible for just
7% of cumulative emissions, and used just 4% of the available
carbon budget (see Figure 1);
• The richest 1% (c.63 million people) alone were responsible for
15% of cumulative emissions, and 9% of the carbon budget –
twice as much as the poorest half of the world’s population (see
Figure 1);
• The richest 5% (c.315 million people) were responsible for over a
third (37%) of the total growth in emissions (see Figure 2), while
the total growth in emissions of the richest 1% was three times that
of the poorest 50% (see Figure 6).

https://oxfamilibrary.openrepositor...b-confronting-carbon-inequality-210920-en.pdf

 

[heimlaga]

A word of caution about broadbrushing the right for women in Africa. There are 54 independant countries in Africa. Many of these countries have provided education for women for decades, and have groundbreaking successes in embracing women's rights. Many of these countries have women cabinet ministers and, in a few cases, leaders of the country. Just another perspective from a fellow African.

Good point. I painted with a too broad brush.

 

[Woody2Shoes]

Presumably you are referring to Russia. Their gdp is 11th in the world at 1.6 trillion USD. Compared to USA at 19.5 and UK at 2.7.

Combined GDP of NATO 42.4 trillion USD.

https://www.worldometers.info/gdp/gdp-by-country/https://countryeconomy.com/countries/groups/nato

Don't forget that a disproportionate amount of Russia's GDP is oil/gas-related!

 

[Woody2Shoes]

From the very blurred wiew I can get through binoculars from the other side of Europe I am not quite set up to draw far reaching conclusions concerning British politics.
Hovewer there is one thing that strikes me. A total lack of either will or ability to deal with systematic flaws.
Housing and energy consumption and energy supply and social issues. All are interwined with one caused by another and causing a third.

I have no intent to be an international besserwisser telling you how to solve the problems. Because I cannot. I just wish people in many contries including both Britain and Finland would stop throwing horse manure at one another and start building a new functional system instead. And hopefully have it well on the way when our present fossil fuel based system falls apart.
What is presently done to remedy the problem is akin to nailing a few lead patches onto the City of Adelaide to make her seaworthy for a trip around the world.

We must all increase self sufficiency, reduce the need for fossil fuels, reduce consumption of natural resources and rebuild the ecosystem both on sea and on land so that it produces more harvestable resources than the depleted ecosystem of today. Rebuild forests to get sustainable timber. Rebuild rivers to get salmon to eat. Rebuild cod stocks in the North Sea. Rebuild nutrient depleted soils. Reduce the need for long distance transport. All this without creating rifts in society. All while building a new energy supply from renewable resources.

Excellent points - I'd add another alternative/partial explanation for the lack of will/ability to deal with systematic flaws, which I think we underestimate, is that powerful vested interests (who are unimaginably wealthy) are actively working to frustrate attempts to sort things out. Just one example - COP26: Fossil fuel industry has largest delegation at climate summit

 

[Jacob]

............ the part of the earth's population that is expanding is generally the poorer part, ......

T'was ever thus.
Increased reproduction is a basic survival technique across all species and cranks up when the going gets tough. The mechanisms vary. Dried up ponds cause Amoeba to 'encyst' and produce thousands of spore. Fish etc in hostile environments produce millions of offspring. Human in stressed environments lose normal constraints, and so on. Also produces labour force to care for the elderly.
So the solution is obvious - reduce stress, increase stability and security, all the obvious things. We see the result in falling pops in many of our most "successful" nations.

 

[Jonm]

Don't forget that a disproportionate amount of Russia's GDP is oil/gas-related!

The west buys the oil/gas and uses it to heat homes, transport and make consumer goods in the case of germany. Russia used the money to buy/make arms to threaten the west and expand their empire. They learnt a thing or two from Hitler/Ribbentrop.