"Green" policies are destroying this country

patnor1011

I wonder how green people propose to cut water usage or conserve water in a country where climate pretty much guarantee that next to nobody does have a swimming pool or need to water their lawn. :)

zerosquared

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122098978#Comment_122098978

A country where they introduced fees and needless hassle to recycle plastic bottles they almost everyone was already recycling these for free? That country?

Best not ask questions from greens expecting a sane answer 🤣

whatever.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122099143#Comment_122099143

This is the Danish method

https://danskretursystem.dk/en/about-deposits/deposit-marks-and-amounts/

A superior system, god knows why we didn't just copy them, would've been easier, cheaper and greener for everyone involved, consumers, people, manufacturers and the environment

zerosquared

https://yle.fi/a/74-20087328

Green parties and policies across Europe were hijacked by Russians who pushed used these useful idiots to push policies that got Europe more hooked on Russian gas and to get rid of any carbon free alternatives like nuclear

These guys don’t even bother hiding anymore

patnor1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122101005#Comment_122101005

You most likely need some sort of an account and app on phone to use that machine but machine is far superior to what is being used here.

I am wondering how this is going to make things more green when if you are returning cans you have to wash them first as their construction does not allow them to be completely emptied without about a minute of vigorous epilepsy like shaking. If you do not wash them then your bag gets dirty and then your hands get dirty and sticky trying to feed 20-30 cans in the machine.

Did our planet saviours factured in water usage needed to wash and clean empty cans?

I am sticking sheet or two of toilett paper inside so it soak in whatever is left inside. I do not want to waste time washing each and every one of them and then shake them and then still have water in a bag.

zerosquared

https://www.euronews.com/green/2024/05/10/two-just-stop-oil-protestors-in-their-80s-smash-glass-around-magna-carta

Insane

machiavellianme

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122120742#Comment_122120742

Using hammers and chisels made from oil based components so as not to hurt their arthritic hands!

zerosquared

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122121697#Comment_122121697

Living about three decades longer than their pre industrial age ancestors too

Larbre34

https://www.rte.ie/news/environment/2024/0514/1448976-nature-restoration-law/

Ryan in a desperate position at this stage. They won't get the support it needs at EU Council before the elections, and after the elections they won't have a EU Parliament that will support it anyway!

The EU Green Deal is in major difficulty and UvdL's second term as CommPres hangs with it.

patnor1011

That still does not stop him from squandering more money flooding radios with ads about how fantastic position we do have regarding wind energy and about a pipeline of wind projects…

Nobody will tell you how much is it going to cost. No wonder as even they do not have a clue.

Pa ElGrande

https://brusselssignal.eu/2024/05/in-depth-the-new-right-wing-dutch-coalition-agreement/

After months of difficult negotiations in the Netherlands, a right-wing coalition Government has been formed.

<snip>

There will also be what was termed a “big impulse” for housing construction, infrastructure and the energy transition, with the building of four nuclear power plants.

<snip>

The country will shift toward climate adaptation rather than fighting climate change.

<snip>

Not only will the Government try to soften the effects of energy bills, requirements on energy labels for houses and mandatory heat pumps will also be eliminated. An announced heightened carbon tax will be pulled back and subsidies for the purchase of electric vehicles will end in 2025.

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2024/05/10/netherlands-approves-grid-fees-for-rooftop-pv-system-owners/#:~:text=The%20competition%20regulator%20in%20the,depending%20on%20the%20system%20size.

The authority said the “terugleverkosten” fees depend on higher purchasing costs, higher imbalance costs, and the net-metering costs that the energy suppliers have to deal with when their customers own and operate rooftop PV systems.

It added that the fees are not a source of profits, as the funds collected with them compensate the lower tariffs paid to consumers who do not own PV installations.

It is not just Netherlands, Australia is planning much the same: https://www.smh.com.au/environment/sustainability/solar-panel-owners-slugged-by-ausgrid-for-generating-too-much-power-20240515-p5jdtx.html

Speaking of Australia, there is a town called Alice Springs in the center of that country and even though the headline says: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2024-04-24/report-shows-pathways-to-power-alice-springs-by-renewables-2030/103728274

"It's becoming increasingly difficult to efficiently absorb more renewables in the middle of the day when the sun is shining, without actually causing instability in the existing generation," he said.

So the only problem with solar power is that there is either too much electricity or not enough, or it disappears when the clouds come over, needs constant back up, and it can’t stabilize the frequency? And don't forget the duck curve when other generation needs to rapidly ramp up as the sun sets every day. It goes to prove yet again that even with an isolated electrical grid like remote area Alice Springs random weather-dependent electricity is non-viable. The Australians already have an experiment at King Island in the Bass strait with Tasmania with no inter-connectors to the mainland and which mainly run on diesel despite having plenty of sun and wind in the roaring forties. If unreliable generation could work anywhere, it would be there, when you can't get the proof of concept to work on an isolated grid, this is not going anywhere else, without swallowing up more subsidies and becoming more expensive and limiting for consumers.

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122148038#Comment_122148038

If only there were the possibility of… storing… some of the additional energy that was generated at peak times to use when the power generation faded later in the day. A sort of , battery, if you will.

zerosquared

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122148133#Comment_122148133

Here is a math exercise for you

How much with it cost (provide capex and opex costs) to store 1GW of energy for 24 hours using batteries at current prices (let’s ignore for a minute that we overpay for everything on this island)

And what will be lifetime of such an installation beofre all batteries need to be replaced

It’s easy to make snarky comments but it seems extraordinary difficult for greens to actually put a cost on their ideas

Pa ElGrande

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122148133#Comment_122148133

If all you want to do is run a few lights, then battery is fine I guess. If the town wants to run refrigeration, air conditioning, car charging, electric showers, cooking or other electric devices, I guess they can wait until midday. They use batteries for short term stability when clouds roll over and sun sets to give gas or diesel plants time to fire up. The AU$8 million they spent will only get them 20 minutes runtime, and they will have to spend the same by the end of the decade to replace those batteries.

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122148262#Comment_122148262

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122148303#Comment_122148303

I'm not a green voter at all. I hate them actually.

But the reality is it makes sense to move away where possible from fossil fuels. Batteries doesnt have to mean actual lithium batteries. For isntance, norway does it for "free" using hydro power - storing water uphill using excess solar and then releasing the potential energy as kinetic later in the day. They are so good at this that they have made an economy out of it!

zerosquared

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122148319#Comment_122148319

So no costing available whatsoever for this “solution”

It may as well be vapourware so

Pa ElGrande

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122148319#Comment_122148319

Alice Springs in Australia is in the middle of a desert, they might be somewhat constrained as regards hydro, unless they want to start pumping from artesian wells. Norway is also reaching capacity constraints and may experience power deficits by 2027. The export of hydro generated power from Norway has also driven up domestic electricity prices, they once had cheap electricity, this does have an impact on domestic politics in that country.

Irelands hydro sources are tapped out, and if you think you are going to use intermittent generation to pump water into Silvermines (press release, not actually delivered) every day, well, here is what the wind turbines have been doing for the last month. It does not matter how many turbines you have, insufficient wind or too much wind means no generation. Wind capacity factors range from 20 to 40% and vary with season. Turlough hill is an economics play, it relies on surplus power at night, to manage electricity demand peaks in the morning and evening. If everyone is charging electric cars and running heat pumps overnight, the economic of running that changes because surplus generation is no longer there and has a high price.

Before you wade through all the press releases about hydrogen (not actual project delivery), that will magically turn all this intermittent generation into energy, lets see proof of concept first, all the projects are really teams harvesting grants, they fail, and move on to the next grant aided project. "Green hydrogen" is all about press releases, these are not bound by real world physics and economics.

The latest scam is carbon capture and storage (CCS) which the salesmen persuaded Eamon Ryan was the future at last UN COP meeting. That does not work either, but it's useful for companies hovering up grants and tax credits.

Clo-Clo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122148451#Comment_122148451

FYI with the newer heat pump the recommendation I heard was not to run overnight and to keep running constantly, letting the house cool down the whole day to then heat up at night costs more than keeping a constant temp in the house

The original recommendations back when they first came out was to use night rate but that's changed from a number of installers I talked to.

Not sure how you can claim Ireland hydro resources are tapped out? based on what? Ireland has little to no hydro while we have plenty of option for small hydro which have not been explored at all yet

Pa ElGrande

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122150587#Comment_122150587

The people pushing net zero aim to stop people using primary energy sources and onto electricity (a secondary source). The people who produce press releases and flashy graphs are looking for 680,000 dwellings with heat pumps by 2030. Unless you have a house designed around heat pumps, most people are not interested, It is much more costly to retrofit an existing dwelling. As you say, you do have to run them all day, tune them for best efficiency and most importantly you need a well insulated and sealed property, with all the internal doors open. Heat pumps can be between 1000 KWh and 10,000 KWh, lets say 3,300 kWh for a 3 bed semi. (back of cigarette packet, that's at least 2,244,000 MWh consumed by 680,000 heat pumps). Without heat pumps, the average household uses 4,200 kWh of electricity each year and 11,000 kWh of gas.

The average mileage in Ireland in 2019 by private cars was 16,352 km. On average an electric vehicle needs 15 kWh for every 100 kilometers. The people who produce reports for government have targeted 936,000 EVs by 2030. (cigarette packet again, let's say 2,453 KWh per vehicle per year would be 2,296,008 MWh consumed)

We generate ~32,981,000 MWh and consume ~30,736,000 MWh. For the extra domestic consumption the targetted EVs and heat pump numbers need an extra 4,540,008 MWh of generation per year by 2030. Moneypoint (915MW) can produce around 7,000,000 MWh in a year. Small hydro is not going to do the job.