Climate Change/Mass Extinction Megathread

[Syt]

Main takeaway, I guess: Vienna is becoming miserable in summer unless there's more measures to cool down the city (i.e. less concrete everywhere, more greenery .... ). Or they need to make it easier to install A/Cs in older buildings without needing landlord's and every neighbor's approval.

[Josquius]

Main takeaway, I guess: Vienna is becoming miserable in summer unless there's more measures to cool down the city (i.e. less concrete everywhere, more greenery .... ). Or they need to make it easier to install A/Cs in older buildings without needing landlord's and every neighbor's approval.

I can imagine.
Lausanne is pretty horrid in summer. Everyone says it wasn't always so. A fair few people I know there plan their holidays specifically to head north away from the heat in August.

I wonder why it is Vienna in particular always seems to be especially hot though.

[Zanza]

Wind and solar have risen to 'new highs' in the EU overtaking fossil fuels for the first time ever

Renewables have broken electricity-generating records in the EU this year, according to the European Commission.

Newly published data has revealed that in the first six months of 2024, half of the bloc's electricity came from renewable sources, outperforming fossil fuels.

The European Commission's 'State of the Energy Union' is an annual stocktake of the bloc's progress towards energy and climate targets.

It says that wind power has now overtaken gas as the EU's second-largest source of electricity behind nuclear power for the first time. The EU also set another record with 56 GW of new solar energy installed in 2023, beating the previous record of 40 GW from 2022.

Energy security and stability of prices are also a major focus in this year's report.

The share of Russian gas in EU imports fell from 45 per cent in 2021 to 18 per cent by June of this year. This was partially due to an increase in imports from countries like Norway and the US but a reduction in demand for gas also played a role.

Between August 2022 and May 2024, demand dropped 18 per cent or 138 billion cubic metres exceeding the voluntary target of 15 per cent.

The State of the Energy Union also found that prices are more stable and remain significantly below what they were during the peak of the energy crisis in 2022.

https://www.euronews.com/green/2024/09/12/wind-and-solar-have-risen-to-new-highs-in-the-eu-overtaking-fossil-fuels-for-the-first-tim

Good news 

[Valmy]

The more Europe can continue in this direction they less they have to give any fucks about Russia and the Middle East...oh and maybe help humanity avoid extinction as well.

[Zanza]

I feel not being dependent on the war criminal Putin and on Prince Bonesaw should be motivation enough even if you don't believe in climate change. But somehow, liking foreign authoritarians and climate change denial seem a common shared political belief.

[Sheilbh]

It is - saw a really interesting long-thread which I now can't find on the need for flexibilty though.

So hour-by-hour EU energy from fossil fuels swings from 15% at the low end to 50% (from last year):


Europe has good wind for winter and good solar for summer so it's not really an issue of managing seasonal change. Instead it's week-by-week flexibility that's a bit of a problem. I feel like more interconnectors with, say, Morocco and storage needs to be a big focus.

I also think demand is part of the story - and I think there it plays a mixed role. Demand for gas has declined since the invasion (which has good and bad sides), but demand for electricity also down by over 10% and I suspect that won't last. The next stage of energy transition is going to be the electrifying of things like vehicles, heating, homes. Lower demand helps but we actually (I think quite soon) need to start seeing rapidly increasing demand for electricity - and making sure that electricity is clean.

It's the various transitions moving at once - needing to move the power basis of our world from fossil fuels to electricity with all the increased demand that implies (I think estimates vary a lot but from what I've seen it is at least doubling current generation), while simultaneously decarbonising electricity supply.

The more Europe can continue in this direction they less they have to give any fucks about Russia and the Middle East...oh and maybe help humanity avoid extinction as well.

This is magical thinking, I'm afraid. Russia is in Europe. The Middle East is Europe's near neighbourhood (and we import solar power from the wider MENA region).

Energy transition will help America in disentangling itself from Old World involvements (from a selfishly European perspective, in that sense, American climate action might be a bit of a double edged sword :ph4r:). But Europe's in Eurasia We will always have to care because they are us.