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Breaking news - Rail freight moves back to Diesel


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Just announced on the Beeb that one of the big rail freight operators is moving back to their laid up Diesel fleet as Electric energy is too expensive.

Just as well that Dai Woodham saved all those steam engines in the mid/late 60's

We'll soon all be using the preserved steam railways ever day.

 

Roger

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17 hours ago, stillp said:

Yes, perhaps they could be converted to burn those wood pellets we import from Canada to save the planet.

Pete

Pete - and there is a huge amount of those wood pellets going to Drax - several long train loads each day, I see multiples of them every time I go back up to Doncaster

- or we could use imported coal from Poland or Australia instead of using domestic supplies (still in the ground but not acceptable/pc to mine our own supplies). Meanwhile China is dominating markets with their products, all manufactured with cheap energy generated using mostly coal fired power stations................

Ian

Edited by cvtrian
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5 hours ago, cvtrian said:

Pete - and there is a huge amount of those wood pellets going to Drax - several long train loads each day, I see multiples of them every time I go back up to Doncaster

- or we could use imported coal from Poland or Australia instead of using domestic supplies (still in the ground but not acceptable/pc to mine our own supplies). Meanwhile China is dominating markets with their products, all manufactured with cheap energy generated using mostly coal fired power stations................)

Ian

I worked on a project at Drax in the late 1990s putting in monstrous great scrubbers to clean up the flue emissions produced by burning coal which was mined locally, it was literally thousands of tonnes of steelwork plus enormous amounts of concrete.

Are we now to assume that it's no longer used because we are transporting wood half way round the world to burn just 25 years later.

George 

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"Are we now to assume that it's no longer used because we are transporting wood half way round the world to burn just 25 years later."

Cheer up George, when enquiring of an attractive young lady a couple of years ago who was dressed in 1940s type apparrel, complete with high waisted voluminus slacks and with a "wartime" hair bun complete with wrapped scarf where she was going, "Drax" was the answer. Apparently their social club (on site I believe) is a noted venue for "Jitterbuggling" and the "Lindy Hop" contests.

Mick Richards

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I cannot understand why the Extinction Rebellion people have not sailed to China and, on arrival, then glued themselves to the roads &/or railways being used to transport coal to the Power Stations - these make the UK's consumption of fossil fuels pale into insignificance.  And I understand that the Chinese are building yet more coal-fired Power Stations - does anyone believe that China will change direction?

And no one seems to talk about birth control, the lack of which is a not insignificant contributor to ever-increasing consumption.

Ian Cornish

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Ian has accurately identified the elephant in the room.

There are too many of us !, carry on the way we are & humans are doomed (doomed I say)

Birth control to start bring the worlds population down to a sustainable level must be the logical answer.

Where is Darwin when you need him ?

Bob

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The problem with birth control is that it simply doesn't work unless imposed on pain of death.

Many third world countries rely (on the family basis) for their existence.

As the parents get older they need the children to support them in the elderly state.  Sadly infant mortality is a great problem.

So you must produce enough so that after early death you still have enough to support you.

Meanwhile all those children are producing their own families - and on and on it goes.

Unlike the UK far too many countries do not have state benefits to get you through those final years.

China tried to regulate child production but this simply cause infanticide on an alarming scale. The Chinese do not want baby girls - so they went for the chop so they could have baby boy as their one child

They are now allowed two children, BUT!!  most child bearing couples now in high rise blocks that do not have enough space to bring up a family

 

Perhaps we should not provide foreign aid and also stop that Bob Geldorf chap saving the world

(A very young0 Roger

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1 hour ago, harlequin said:

I worked on a project at Drax in the late 1990s putting in monstrous great scrubbers to clean up the flue emissions produced by burning coal which was mined locally, it was literally thousands of tonnes of steelwork plus enormous amounts of concrete.

Are we now to assume that it's no longer used because we are transporting wood half way round the world to burn just 25 years later.

George 

Hi George

Yes, the coal scrubbers have been adapted and added too/replaced in order to scrub the different flue gasses from burning "sustainable wood pellets", they need twice as much cleaning and maintenance when burning wood, and the thermal efficiency of wood is also less than coal. The difference is government policy and grant money.

The local coal you mentioned was primarily from open cast mines around the Selby coalfield, all of which are now closed.

When you see images of power station putting plumes of clouds into the air - 90% of it is steam from the cooling towers, not boiler/combustion gasses

Ian

Edited by cvtrian
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1 hour ago, cvtrian said:

 

The local coal you mentioned was primarily from open cast mines around the Selby coalfield, all of which are now closed.

 

Ian

During this year there was serious lobbying in parliament to try and keep an open cast coal mine open and to open another two open cast mines.

These produced top quality coal highly suitable for the Steam preservation groups and quality steel production.

They were shouted down but the Loony Greens

So what is happening now - we buy rubbish coal from Poland (transport costs, UK money going abroad, greater pollution) and better quality coal (not as good as the UK stuff) from Russia. The carbon/CO2 foot print is very large. Still, the stupid Greens must be very happy

 

Roger

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50 minutes ago, Peter Clark said:

Around twelve years ago I had a guy training with me, he had been made redundant when the mine he managed closed and was becoming an Engineer Surveyor, he told me that all the coal trucks were disposed of by deliberately pushing them down the mine to prevent it being easily re opened.

The trucks were only a small part of the waste, most of the deep mines were closed with all the functioning equipment left in place and no maintenance regime implemented - I believe they are all now flooded due to a lack of pumping water.
Around Yorkshire, a large number of the pit tops have been cleared and developed for housing after capping the shafts.
Ian

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One of the BBC news topics this evening was that the UK recorded its lowest birth rate for the fifth year in a row.

This may sound good regarding world population numbers - but is not even a drop in the ocean.

Also if this continues it means that a smaller and smaller working population wilt be funding more and more retired old bu99ers

So on the one hand the worlds need a smaller population but that would need for the elderly population not to be there - certainly in the UK

You can't have less children and more  pensioners - some thing has to give.

 

Roger

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25 minutes ago, RogerH said:

One of the BBC news topics this evening was that the UK recorded its lowest birth rate for the fifth year in a row.

This may sound good regarding world population numbers - but is not even a drop in the ocean.

Also if this continues it means that a smaller and smaller working population wilt be funding more and more retired old bu99ers

So on the one hand the worlds need a smaller population but that would need for the elderly population not to be there - certainly in the UK

You can't have less children and more  pensioners - some thing has to give.

 

Roger

Funny I was having a conversation with a Friend this weekend about one of their parents who has a terminal ilness. The parent involved wanted to be able to have a dignified end when the time came but was told it was illegal to decide themselves when they want to go. Instead they are horrified at the thought of being kept alive in the future with no quality of life consuming endless resources and medications for no purpose or as they see it, valid reason.

maybe we ought to stop fighting nature and work with it

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My wife is Dutch so we have lots of relatives in Holland where its perfectly normal to decide when you have had enough of a terminal illness.

Last year one of my brother in-laws who was 83 and suffering with lung cancer made the decision, it involved discussions with his doctor and a specialist nurse, once this was done a date was set, Ron then had a family party to say goodbye and late that evening he was gone.

In a way its a bit strange but so much more dignified than suffering 

George 

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The birth control argument (often although not always tacitly implying birth control in far-away, developing countries) in response to global climate change is too often a convenient excuse for not doing enough about carbon emissions per capita.

The G20 countries contribute 80 percent of global CO2 emissions despite having low and in some cased negative population growth rates (China is about to go negative). Globally the birth rate has fallen from more than 5 per woman in 1965 to 2.4 in 2019, and will fall below the long term replacement level this decade. In developing countries, the fertility rate invariably plummets of its own accord in countries when girls start to receive a decent education and where people are able to be reasonably positive about their long term economic prospects and the existence of a basic social welfare safety net. Global population will of course continue to rise for several decades, due to improvements in life expectancy (I realise a few might argue for culling some of the old 'uns, but I'm personally not going to acknowledge that here as a serious option).

Meanwhile, in that same period, 1965-2019, global greenhouse gas emissions trebled. So fixating on trying to reduce birth rates would be looking in the wrong direction. The world's population will in any case peak around 2060-70, depending on which model you prefer, but will certainly be falling steadily by the end of the century (which will bring in a whole heap of other challenges, incidentally). But by then we are probably looking at a 4C to 5C global temperature rise unless we do more to reduce emissions per capita, rather than wishing that half the world's population just didn't exist.

Nigel

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