How are you going to deal with Climate Change?

A burning question that I wanted to raise is how people are going to be dealing with climate change, which is a very real risk as seen by the horrendous heatwave across America and Canada.

How are you going to adapt your lifestyle and way of life to suit the changing climate, it's inevitable that storms are going to get worse and that it'll get hotter etc.

How are you going to handle it?

Not buy a property on the coast!

Buy shares in Nivea.

By obtaining a J80 or J100 Toyota Land Cruiser.

By living the good life whilst I can.
There's no point in me as a 30 year old planning for a conventional retirement.

The situation now is beyond any hope of recovery. In 40 years time we will all be either burning, starving, drowning or fighting off the people who are.

LOL The Irony said:

By obtaining a J80 or J100 Toyota Land Cruiser.

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To use as a paper-weight?

I try to cycle and walk as much as I can. My wife is very proactive in getting our household to be as plastic free as possible. Toothpaste in glass jars, bars or soap for shower, sink and even old fashioned dish soap instead of washing up liquid.

Probably by having to install air conditioning - I can see London emptying out in the summer and parts of the underground becoming unbearable

By not obsessing over the average sea level possibly rising by 1cm when it goes up and down by 1300 times as much twice a day round here. Or the average temperature maybe rising by 1 degree when we cope quite happily with a 25 degree range even in the UK.

I have been considering getting a portable air conditioner. I certainly would never buy a house on a flood plain or nearby.

The UKs climate is driven by wind pattern (jet stream) ocean temperatures and the sun.

It is well published that suns activity (and strength) varies through the solar cycle (which is about every 11 years when it’s magnetic poles reverse, so 22 years for complete cycle)

It is also known there are longer cycles (and elliptical orbit) also affects suns warming. It was warmer in Britain when Romans were here, cooler during dark ages, warmer again during 1400s and 1500s, then cooler during Maunder Minimum (little ice age). All evidenced from tree growth rings.

Appears sun spot activity has been very low and could actually be entering another of the Cooler periods like 1700s, so insulating house, getting solar panels and a big electric energy storage unit (think Tesla powerwall, other brands available) is way forward.

As for sea level rising, I thought it had fallen again over last 15 years or so, which is why you rarely hear about it now.

One of the oddities of British weather is the weaker suns activity seems to be causing less buckling of the jet stream, so getting periods of high pressure at times (think of the lovely weather at start of first lockdown), but side effect of this more static setup is it can have 2-3 weeks of hotter temperatures in summer and colder in winter as air gets trapped. Can also lead to wet periods being longer (higher risk of filling rivers and flood plains, which isn’t really a problem except where some idiot built on them).

The current situation in Canada seems to be one of these trapped air, as jet stream buckles are elsewhere (probably explains why some US National Parks are still too cold and snowy to open at normal time this year).

When we lived on SW London - Surrey border needed to use our portable air conditioner at times. But since moving to West Wiltshire it has stayed unused in garage, doesn’t get so hot here (although new house being B rated for energy means better able to cope). However the hills around here (near Bath) meant we changed to all season tyres on second car, and have a set of winter wheels and tyres on main car for November-April (much safer in wet below +10c, and stops you ending up in ditch when frosty, and can still drive up a hill when it snows with 2 wheel drive)

If you want to protect yourself, then get an allotment or garden big enough to grow some food for when inevitable shortages occur.

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XAM2175 said:

To use as a paper-weight?

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To drive. Since it'll allegedly be an apocalypse, I'll also obtain an S&W Model 29 and an AR-15.


(There is going to be no apocalypse, but I'm keeping the Land Cruiser)

I retired, stopped working for firms producing unnecessary wasteful 'goods'. I live on the edge of a small town, can do all my errands by cycle or foot, rarely travel by train. Stocking up on free cherries thanks to municipal munificence.

Dai Corner said:

....Or the average temperature maybe rising by 1 degree when we cope quite happily with a 25 degree range even in the UK.

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The thing that's missing from that consideration (based on my understanding which is, admittedly, quite limited) is that it's not just about average rise in temperature. It's the far wider and bigger knock-on effect that has - whether it be in prologed droughts or extreme rainfall and flooding or other extreme weather events that we are simply not able to cope with.

As to what I am doing: recycling as much as is reasonable; driving without using fossil fuel and using public transport, again, when it's reasonably practical. As to what I will do: at the age of 68, I'll probably have died before it is likely to have much effect on me.

Dai Corner said:

Or the average temperature maybe rising by 1 degree when we cope quite happily with a 25 degree range even in the UK.

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Climate ≠ Weather

After decades of driving huge distances for work, I gave it all up and started my own business within walking distance from home about 15 years ago. My car is 13 years old (bought new) and has only done 25k miles, so averaging 2k per year! Not only am I reducing pollution, I've also lost 5 stones in weight, reduced by blood pressure tablets etc., so my own health has massively improved too, just by the daily walking.

We tend not to buy "shiny new things", and I still wear clothes that are 10-20 years old, still using pretty old, almost obsolete tech, etc. So our finances are also healthy because we've not wasted loads of money on gadgets and other unnecessary consumer rubbish. Rather than recycle, we concentrate on the other two "R"s, i.e. reduce and reuse!

najaB said:

Climate ≠ Weather

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For all things there is XKCD



(Links are to the webcomic XKCD regarding climate changes over time.)

My Contribution: We’re awaiting the installation of PV solar panels and batteries. The final sums haven’t been done yet but we have a large south-facing roof and will install as many batteries as we could realistically charge. Not sure yet about ground source technology but as soon as it could replace our gas boiler, we’ll be doing so.

Next year I will need a new car for retired life - I shall choose the greenest option that suits my needs. If it has batteries (not yet a given) I’ll be charging it using the stored solar power when at home.

I’m also looking at rainwater storage and re-use systems for non-drinking water.

In terms of coping with the extreme weather resulting from climate change: air-con via an air-source heat pump will not only keep us cool but it will potentially use our solar battery power. It may also be able to heat our kitchen more efficiently than gas-powered under-floor heating. Not sure about that yet.

When I eventually move out and get my own house, I will try and use solar power if I can afford it, as well as growing my own vegetables.

It's inevitable that we will see food shortages and even hotter weather.

I'll also be moving away from the coast (I stay in Saltcoats and they are already planning on moving the railway)

EssexGonzo said:

Next year I will need a new car for retired life - I shall choose the greenest option that suits my needs. If it has batteries (not yet a given) I’ll be charging it using the stored solar power when at home.

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If you can find a way to charge the car directly from the solar panels, you would avoid the losses involved in using an intermediate set of batteries.

EssexGonzo said:

It may also be able to heat our kitchen more efficiently than gas-powered under-floor heating. Not sure about that yet.

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UFH is one of the ideal use cases for heat pumps. The "low & slow" (relatively low temperature, compared to gas but on throughout the day to maintain room temperature vs blasting heat out of radiators when it gets cold in mornings and evenings) is well suited to the sort of duty cycles you can get from heat pumps

Ediswan said:

If you can find a way to charge the car directly from the solar panels, you would avoid the losses involved in using an intermediate set of batteries.

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You're also then disadvantaged if you need to charge the car up and it's a cloudy winter's day! Worth bearing in mind though that a full EV does represent around 50kWh of battery sitting on the drive (though as yet, there is no way of 'backcharging' from a car to house, despite all the talk) when you come to spec the house battery

Domh245 said:

(though as yet, there is no way of 'backcharging' from a car to house, despite all the talk) when you come to spec the house battery

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I'm not sure that's the case. Several reports of smug Tesla owners (is there any other kind?) boasting of how they had power during the Texas blackouts back in February.

najaB said:

I'm not sure that's the case. Several reports of smug Tesla owners (is there any other kind?) boasting of how they had power during the Texas blackouts back in February.

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Ah possibly. I try my hardest to avoid anything Tesla so wouldn't have seen, but it might have been their 'powerwall' rather than the car? Even then, I note that the powerwall can't take charge from the car. The only other references I can see in relation to "tesla texas blackout" is to do with people sleeping inside their car, and keeping that warm rather than an entire house

Domh245 said:

You're also then disadvantaged if you need to charge the car up and it's a cloudy winter's day!

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I was not suggesting making a UK based EV dependant on solar power. That would be 'brave'.

Ediswan said:

If you can find a way to charge the car directly from the solar panels, you would avoid the losses involved in using an intermediate set of batteries.

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A bit tricky overnight.

Domh245 said:

Ah possibly. I try my hardest to avoid anything Tesla so wouldn't have seen, but it might have been their 'powerwall' rather than the car?

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I'll have a hunt for a link or two. I know that Tesla changed their position on vehicle to grid about a year ago so it's entirely possible that they were talking EV rather than powerwall.

A lot of the climate change stories are designed as scare stories, how many feet of sea-level rise has occured in say Cleethorpes since the industrial revolution started, no one knows, and yet some climate change studies are saying Doncaster will be on the coast in just 9 years. I studied environmental science and sea-levels are extremely hard to measure at the best of times, not just because of variable tides, but because in some parts of the world the ground is shrinking, and in others rising naturally. For example much of Europe is still rebounding from the weight of the glacial period in the last Ice Age.
The climate will always change as it's usually regarded as typical weather for a 30 year period, and weather is never consistent, now or in the past, today we think every single storm or flood is caused by climate change, but realistically big changes require an excessive amount of time, longer than our lifespan. Cliffs may erode, droughts and floods will happen, but nothing like the Hollywood disaster films.

Already the governments of the World look to be heading towards low pollution and low emission power sources within 20 years, only thing we can do in the mean time is to stop relying on imports from China, America etc, as shipping is particularly bad for pollution.

As Climate Change has always happened and is driven by the Sun I realise that there is very very little humanity can do and we should instead be putting our efforts into controlling pollution
I note the same organisations and people pushing Manmade Climate Change are the same who pushed the C19 "pandemic" and are also profiting from it

We're going to need a bigger sandpit if there are already this many heads being buried in it

We're going to need more people to wake up and smell the roses. Al Gore said the American coast would be underwater in 20 years and then bought a house by the beach. His house isn't underwater. It's been completely overstated IMO.