To feel really worried about climate change in this heatwave

[Fulbe]

This heatwave has been caused by climate change but there seems to be hardly any discussion about this at all. It seems that people are focused so much on getting air con or massive paddling/ swimming pools without thinking how that might be actually contributing to the problem. People outside the school gates idling their engines to keep their air con turned on whilst creating more pollution.

I think I remember reading somewhere that we've released 6 million years' worth of CO2 in the past 150 years. Something needs to stop but consumption and car use seem to be increasing.

Am I the only one to be concerned about this and that we're just slipping into a future of more dangerous heatwaves?

Are those memories more important than the well being of the planet?

DD doesn't get to see anything interesting airport to meeting room to hotel to home. Ridiculous.

Seriously! you think weather forecasts are accurate to the hour ? Yesterday the weather forecast for my area was wall to wall sunshine from dawn til dusk. From 05:30 when i got out of bed, it was grey, we had rain at 10:30 and no sun until 12:15, so not in the slightest bit accurate.

Renewables can be done. But depends which ones and how they are paid. Texas has cheap cheap energy because nat gas and a large renewables rollout are used together

Yes not ideal but they're not as backward thinking as the west makes out

Does a world getting hotter not require less energy to cool?

Honestly we are seriously discussing retirement to Scotland in the next 5 to 10 years, as the temperatures there will be more bearable, and it's beautiful

Mail and postage from a number of developing countries is subsidised by the UN. China, India etc - this is why we can order so much cheap stuff and get it shipped. Cancel this and it saves a lot of pollution and landfill.

They might become inundated and demand independence to keep “us foreigners” out!!!!

Changes to what?

The UK is absolutely irrelevant in terms of climate change. We contribute nothing to it and can't do anything about it. Every single "environmental" policy we have, is just a vanity project. We cant do anything about any of it.

The winters are pretty miserable though.

Their taxation rates are higher than ours.

And they have midges.

I suspect like other parts of England the beautiful places are well out of the way of stuff like the sort of facilities you need when you are old. Like hospitals.

I'm not sure how the increased taxation would stack up against a decent air con installation.

Hard agree.

Temu/Shein et al is evil incarnate.

The planet will be fine. Stop overreacting. It's just a plane journey. Same plane journey she'd be taking if she's on holiday.

If she doesn't see anything interesting, she seems to be a bit boring. The evenings exist, she can go out and see some nice restaurants and/or the sites. She can go for an evening walk.

The UK already decarbonised a lot under the Tories. Do we really need to destroy our industries more under net zero zealotry?

Most businesses these days would do that sort of business over video conference. Sending people is expensive and only done if absolutely necessary (if you are an efficient business).

Video conferencing has curtailed a significant amount of business travel since COVID.

We can call for action or not but that strikes me as such a weird position. We’re a big economy and with significant soft power. And with a population that has a per capita carbon footprint way over the global average.

Not only that, but as a society we’re still being conditioned to “look up to” people with high status, which 99% of the time cirelated directly with very rich people with massive carbon footprints. Be they popular YouTube creators, members of the royal family, film stars, Musk had Trump, sports stars.

For me the crux of the issue has always been and will continue to be - that you can’t on the one hand have a system that glorifies wealth and consumption and makes these “prime consumers” into Gods - while on the other hand lecturing and castigating “normal people” for aspiring to own a 4 bedroom home, a nice brand car, and going on one or two Ryanair holidays each year.

Is rich good or is rich bad? It can’t be both.

But aviation for leisure is responsible for a grand total of about 1%-2% of global emissions. And of course even THAT leisure isn’t really just “leisure”. As leisure is tourism which is also a significant part of many country’s economies. Hotels, restaurants, shop owners, airport staff, cleaners, tax drivers etc etc

I think limiting normal holiday travel is not the biggest way to solve this. As you say - staying in hotels and eating local food is a great way to spend money in other countries and keeps us all (hopefully) friends and neighbours.

People need to stop buying shedloads of tat and stop constantly updating their homes and gardens with even more industrially created crap.

Dunelm can do one. B&M can bugger off. Shein is shit and Temu can trot on.
There are many more culprits but us, the consumers, are going to have to vote with our pounds if we want any real climate change.

What the issue with furniture?

I'd rather be rich than poor

I quite like furniture

I find it very convenient.

Someone in crying about Dunelm and B&M

Normal holiday travel is exactly the travel that is worthless to humanity in the long term. Bob and Sue going to Lanzarote in 1996 had no positive impact. We waste a vast amount of resources moving people round the planet for no purpose other than selfish enjoyment.

But they enjoyed it. They made good memories and had fun.

Why is anyone bothering to engage with that muppet? It's been obvious from the start.