Toasty!

[flatandy]

Build better flood defences. Research methods of desalinating soil for lowland floodplains. Make sure we're able to relocate people whose habitats are destroyed by changing sea levels. Find ways of mitigating desertification through planting appropriate crops along the edges of deserts. Build water desalination plants. And so on, and so forth. There's tons we can do to mitigate the impacts rather than just stick our heads in the sand and hope it doesn't happen.

And that's not even taking into account the stuff that "we" (by which I mean mankind, the collective governments, etc, rather than individuals) can do to reduce the climate's change in the first place.

[nobody]

I did ask if you intended building a wall either side of all the rivers, do you honestly believe that would work?

De-salination plants? No shortage of water.

Re-locate people? What do you propose, build a mountain?

Crops at the edge of the desert? It's usually to hot.

[flatandy]

Well, you asked Lala, not me.

Also, I suspect from your answers you don't actually understand what the problems are - there is, for example, a massive shortage of fresh water if you don't happen to live in England. And with higher sea levels bringing more sea water into our fresh water supplies, it's possible that even Britain could need desalination plants

[nobody]

I understand the problems, I'm waiting to hear your and lala's solutions, other than bland meaningless comments about, what about if? What about dis-placed people, etc

[flatandy]

Well you implied that my solutions three posts up were flawed, yet that showed you didn't understand the problems.

[nobody]

Ok, where are you going to build your first flood defence?

[flatandy]

I'd start expanding the Dutch-style flood-engineering that they have on their polders to other lowland regions and countries. If it were down to me, I'd start off in Bangladesh which probably has the highest population at risk from sea level change. But, you know, East Anglia, Florida, all kinds of places could use this kind of help.

[nobody]

Have you told the people of Bangladesh to start building? Or do you think other nations should pay for it. And what exactly are you proposing, a huge wall all along the seaboard?

[flatandy]

I think the global community as a whole should help out, particular given the relative poverty of a country like Bangladesh.

And what I'm proposing is systems like they have in the Netherlands - dams, dykes, canals and channels, flood gates, pumping stations, and so on. Not just a big wall. That would be stupid on a Trumpian scale.

[nobody]

That's basically a big wall.

Is that to keep the fresh water in and salinated out?

Do you think China will donate money? Or any other emerging nation?

What are you prepared to do?

I ask in all seriousness, because sometime ago, you said you sat down to a ten course dinner. I have no idea how much you paid for it, but on my working holiday £35 is enough to feed a school of five hundred (500) for a day.




The the edit is because this spell check seems to think I mean salivate

[flatandy]

I would like a portion of the tax money of everybody who earns a decent crust to go towards climate change mitigation, yes. That would include me, probably you, and very few Gambians.

[nobody]

We already pay a green tax.

A waste of money imo, it's just a tax.

China is an emerging nation, do you think they care about climate change?

Farmers are cutting down the rain forest, do they care?

Have the Americans given up their cars yet?

[flatandy]

We already pay a green tax.

Do we?

A waste of money imo, it's just a tax.

That's because tax money is not spent on mitigating climate change

China is an emerging nation, do you think they care about climate change?

Yes they do. The government's signed up to Kyoto, signed up to a new agreement with the US last year, has been the victim of some serious climate change related issues - particularly desertification at the edge of the Gobi which has massively increased Beijing's already terrible air quality issues.

Farmers are cutting down the rain forest, do they care?

Some do, some don't, I'm sure. Some probably don't think they have a choice and have to act in the short term. Also, this has not really got much to do with mitigating the problems created by climate change

Have the Americans given up their cars yet?

No. And what has this got to do with the stuff above?

[nobody]

So Americans are still polluting the atmosphere with gas guzzlers. The Chinese don't want the same lifestyle as you appear to have, ditto Amazonian farmers, and you don't either because you might end up under water(according to you)

And I'm yet to see you suggest anything practical to deal with the impending floods.

You could try digging a big hole and use the spoil to build a mountain for dis-placed people, this would be a double whammy.

[Deleted]

The planet'll go back to what it was before the north and south poles froze, which'll mean massive human displacement, strife, disease and death. Then the survivors'll scratch around for a few hundred thousand years and start again. A bit like the French revolution on a larger scale.

[lala]

Mar 22, 2016 17:49:43 GMT nobody said:

Some is due to mankind , most is natural process, what else would you like me to say?

Now tell me what you propose/suggest mankind should do about it?

There are two areas of response, mitigating current / near term future climate change and preventing mid to long term future climate change.

Obviously, if you don't accept anthropogenic climate change, the latter list wouldn't seem important.

MITIGATION

1 - First priority is to stop mass migration and conflicts resulting from climate change. So, as Andy suggested, we need to try to make areas likely to be hit by natural disasters or affected by inundation habitable. We don't want people leaving Bangladesh. So massive building of flood defences will help keep them there. Social programmes to help keep people living in the developing world rather than traipsing of to Europe and America would also help.

2 - Given that water shortages may drive future migration and conflict, Andy's desalination plants are not as out there as they might seem.

3 - Cities like London are going to be Hellish in a few years time. Calcutta and Mexico city even more so. We need to re-design and re-develop cities to make them smaller and more habitable in a warmer world. In 2003, a European heat wave was identified as causing 70,000 deaths.

4 - Set up a massive development fund to encourage the developing world to develop in a sustainable manner. As the western world has massively, and I mean massively, benefited from burning heaps of fossil fuels, they can pay for it.

PREVENTION

1 - Stop burning fossil fuels (87% human CO2 emissions come from the burning of fossil fuels). We can't stop burning oil for transport in the immediate future, but we can cut out its use for power generation. Coal and natural gas burning for power also needs to stop. Soon. there are cleaner alternatives and the more we invest in them the cheaper and more effective they will be. For things like flight which is unlikely to be divorced from fossil fuels for a long time, prices will have to sky rocket to compensate from emissions.

2 - Stop and reverse deforestation. Deforestation is responsible about a tenth of human CO2 emissions. We need to stop cutting down trees. re-foresting areas will also have a bit of a positive impact.

3 - To make that happen, we'll need to reduce meat consumption, and stop clearing forests so we can have cheap soy and palm oil. Sorry, food is going to cost more. Get used to mung.

4 - Massive birth control programmes. We have enough people for now, thank you. Replace your self, no more. If the Chinese can do it, so can we.

Note that none of these require an individual to switch off their internet. No muds huts involved. Straight forward ideas to keep our standard of living at something like what it is just now, without so much of the climate ruining emissions.

[nobody]

Well, good luck with all that, you must know all totally unworkable.

Andy doesn't seem to know that gas guzzlers use fossile fuel and are part of the problem .


I do wonder what you intend building these flood defences from.

[lala]

That's why flood defences is in the mitigation section. We might have to do stuff that - in the short term - actually increases CO2 emissions.

The only ones that I would regard as fundamentally difficult are redesigning cities and limiting population. But since you didn't demand realism I didn't feel constrained by it. And if we continue to live in sweltering hell holes, it will just mean more deaths, and that might act as a population brake ...

The rest of them are perfectly doable if our lords and masters decide it is worth doing. Given their lack of concern for the little people, I'm not overly optimistic.

[nobody]

Prevention, item 2.

Try telling that to farmers who are cutting down trees to get themselves a standard of living comparable to yours.

It's nice you don't consider it realistic, and say Its because I don't demand realism

[nobody]

Have you seen the new Emirates A380 btw, takes over a hour to refuel, how many trees is that?