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Post by GroundSquirrel on May 19, 2020 17:55:15 GMT
Tup: Looks nice and warm Have you seen any palm trees growing in the wild yet? Btw how does Finland see themselves dealing with their future energy needs? Was once again reminded of this today: Burning coal (dead plant material) = BAD Burning biomass (live trees that produce oxygen) = GOOD The mind still boggles!
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Post by Tup on May 28, 2020 17:55:50 GMT
Tup : Looks nice and warm Have you seen any palm trees growing in the wild yet? Btw how does Finland see themselves dealing with their future energy needs? Was once again reminded of this today: Burning coal (dead plant material) = BAD Burning biomass (live trees that produce oxygen) = GOOD The mind still boggles! That's never going to happen... Or maybe it will, you know, those Norwegians are essentially pumping prehistorical palm trees (or what ever) so who knows. There's lots of talk about biomass (=basically wood) but I think that's the most ridiculous idea ever. I don't see how burning wood could be a good thing. It's just doesn't make sense. Sure, it's renewable, but what about the pollution? Luckily though, it seems like they have realised that nuclear power is important so that'll likely be the main source in the future. Hydropower is peanuts here for obvious reasons. Wind power can do something. Solar power? Well, when it's summer... sun does shine 24/7 but even then it's not that powerful. When it's winter the sun doesn't either rise at all (Northern-Finland) or it rises just barely. Weather has bee quite nice now - close to 20c and at times little over.
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Post by GroundSquirrel on May 29, 2020 19:48:55 GMT
The whole renewable energy/biomass thing is just one big farce. Wind turbines aren't going to do it. They're unreliable since it's not always windy. Solar panels are pretty useless at night and less efficient under cloudy circumstances. And yeah, biomass is a joke. Cutting down entire forests that convert carbondioxide to oxygen. Is this going to continue until there's not a single tree left standing? It's funny... there are people who get mad if the Amazon's on fire, but entire forests getting cut down for biomass power plants doesn't concern them? So in Finland there's not too much concern about nuclear power? The powers that be in Brussels wouldn't be too happy about that since they want to phase out nuclear power. Probably posted this before, but to achieve net-zero carbon emissions in 2050 the European Union would have to open a nuclear power plant with an output of 1.5 gigawatts every 9 days until 2050, which comes down to having about 1230 nuclear power plants by then. If you'd rather have wind power the EU would have to build 1500 wind turbines every 9 days. Solar panels then? Apparently they'd have to install 14 million new solar panels in the EU every 9 days. So it's pretty clear to assume that the whole green deal is something that can never be achieved.
Btw Michael Moore's documentary "Planet of the Humans" was removed from Youtube due to some copyright infringement... What a surprise!
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Post by ladyaly on May 30, 2020 10:05:12 GMT
Oh wow !!! We had already some pretty hot days, very early very dry this year
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Post by Tup on Jun 2, 2020 19:39:18 GMT
So in Finland there's not too much concern about nuclear power? The powers that be in Brussels wouldn't be too happy about that since they want to phase out nuclear power.
I don't know what those dimwits are thinking but burning coal and wood isn't definitely going to cut it. It's pretty much the best alternative right now. Hydropower can be rather nice too in places where it's possible. We can only pray that someone figures out how to get fusion rector working. But for the time being... Oh wow !!! We had already some pretty hot days, very early very dry this year Guess what's funny? The winter actually never came. Basically zero snow and the little that we got melted instantly. Norther-Finland on the other hand got shitloads of snow.
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Post by GroundSquirrel on Jun 2, 2020 20:04:07 GMT
Those dimwits in Brussels only care about making all of their spreadsheet cells green. Never mind that it turns red somewhere else.
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Post by GroundSquirrel on May 21, 2022 1:20:27 GMT
So yesterday morning there was a protest from a bunch of tree huggers near where I work. They raised blockades and some of them glued themselves to the asphalt or tied themselves to vats filled with cement 🙄 Some of my colleagues were also hindered by these idiots while either trying to get to work or leaving home after their night shift.
Glad I was working the late shift today and missed out on all this crap.
They're whiny too:
Gee... only when people were slowly driving into you you decide to clear the road. Be glad they weren't driving into you full throttle 🙄
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Post by GroundSquirrel on Jul 1, 2022 19:06:32 GMT
We don't need the Russians to destroy my country 🙄 The government is showing that they are perfectly capable of doing this themselves. Three weeks ago they declared the war on the farmers by telling them that many farmers will be expropriated. Today they declared the war on the fishermen. On Monday the farmers will be protesting at several locations, including the Port of Rotterdam, which probably means that I won't be able to get to work. If that's the case then so be it. I support the farmers 🚜🚜🚜
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Post by GroundSquirrel on Jul 9, 2022 22:35:44 GMT
Well, the farmers did protest in several locations. Mostly causing a blockade at distribution centres for grocery stores. They didn't block Port of Rotterdam yet, so I was able to go to work. Some fishermen blocked some of the other ports though. Anyway, a few shelves in the stores remained empty for a day or two. Still the shit has only started hitting the fan now... On Tuesday another protest ran out of hand when a tractor was fired at by a police officer: There was a police blockade and some tractors tried to drive past it. The police shot at one of the tractors. In no time the police (and mainstream media) reported that they only fired warning shots at a tractor driver who was attempting to "drive into the police and their service vehicles". The driver of the tractor was arrested later that evening for attempted manslaughter. Meanwhile video footage was showing up on the Internet that clearly showed that the tractor driver was driving past the police blockade with no intention of driving into it. Later that evening it turned out that the bullet that hit the tractor could have killed the driver if it had just been off by an inch! Yep, definitely looks like warning shots... The next day the news reported that the tractor driver was just a 16 year old kid He was released later on and the charge of manslaughter was dropped. Now imagine if no one had caught this on camera...
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Post by ladyaly on Jul 10, 2022 9:45:50 GMT
Damn - sounds terrible. Kind of like in the US - you get shot in the back and they claim YOU were attacking them. Especially if you have a different skin color.
Your police don't seem to take much time either....
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Post by GroundSquirrel on Jul 13, 2022 23:10:10 GMT
ladyaly : well, as far as the police is concerned it's been going down for a while now when it comes to excessive violence. Especially these last 2 years with all anti-covid measures protests and now the farmers protests. Strange enough you don't see this when BLM or the tree huggers are protesting... Sure there are always bad apples among any protest, but they're not the ones being targeted. And it's not just something you see where I live. It happens in plenty of other countries all over the world. Seen footage of excessive police violence in Germany too. Prof. Nils Melzer, was a Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment for the U.N. He wrote a report on the excessive violence the police was using during the c-19 protests in my country. Apparently he had to step down at the end of March even though his term was supposed to last til October this year. Gee, I wonder why 🤔 Anyway, the parents of Jouke, the kid who was driving the tractor that was shot at, are planning on filing a police report. Although they want to talk to the police officer who fired at the tractor first. A farmers interest group is also filing a police report for attempted homicide.
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Post by GroundSquirrel on Dec 18, 2022 19:46:44 GMT
So the EU in all its wisdom has decided that in 2027 citizens will have to pay a CO2 tax for heating and transport. As if we don't pay enough for fuel and keeping our house warm. I'm sure this is just the start, because the hungry caterpillar will never satisfied. I still have my old energy contract, but it ends in February next year. So looking forward to the new term amounts. Meanwhile at work there've been also been some interesting developments: because of the increased energy prices they will only run at half capacity for now and next year. They say no one's getting fired. Somehow that's hard to believe.
Anyhoo, hope everyone manages to stay warm for the holidays.
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Post by GroundSquirrel on Dec 20, 2022 22:28:16 GMT
Btw things have gotten really "interesting" at work lately. With the increased energy and raw material costs the powers that be at my workplace have decided to basically shut down half of the plants. This of course means less work for us at the lab too. Still it can be rather busy when there are problems.
Because of longterm illnesses and another colleague now working on another project for the next year and a half we lost a third of the people in the shifts. We have one temp to fill in for the people on sick leave, but only until March.
Management said they won't fire anyone, but fixed-term contracts won't be renewed and people who quit will not be replaced either.
I wonder how long they'll be able to keep this up.
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Post by ladyaly on Dec 21, 2022 12:13:49 GMT
We are struggling here with an extreme shortage of workers, especially skilled ones. Employers do not dare to fire workers at the moment because otherwise production would come to a complete halt. In the hospitals, the situation is devastating, especially children's hospitals. We are living in bad times, who would have thought that there would be shortages and war in Europe ....
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Post by GroundSquirrel on Dec 23, 2022 21:22:00 GMT
Yeah… shortage of workers everywhere.
Quite odd isn’t it? First we had the c-19 crisis with all the lockdowns. Some businesses didn’t last. Some barely did.
Now there’s the energy crisis and the businesses that barely managed to survive the c-19 lockdowns are now getting the final push. But on top of that there are now businesses like bakeries going bankrupt, because their energy costs are 6 times more than what they used to be.
Add to that the war on the farmers and the fishing industry. It’s not only the farmers and fishermen who will lose their jobs. It’s also about the jobs of the people working in the affiliated businesses. It wouldn’t surprise me if industrial plants will eventually move their production to Asia. I know that it's rather easy to take apart a chemical plant in one country and rebuild it somewhere else.
So I guess we have to hang on a bit longer. The shortage of workers problem will sort out itself eventually 🤔
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