General > General Technical Chat

Biden admin moving forward with light bulb bans in coming weeks

<< < (22/42) > >>

james_s:

--- Quote from: coppice on April 04, 2023, 12:13:08 am ---I'm used to 230V bulbs. US ones probably flicker less. Try looking at the THD in the current waveform or power consumption of a 230V incandescent bulb, when fed with a clean voltage signal. Many are over 20%. That's a clue to much that filament is heating and cooling every half cycle of the mains, and how much the light output is modulated.

--- End quote ---

It's true, they are different. 120V bulbs have shorter, thicker filaments that are significantly more efficient due to reduced heat losses, and 60Hz power is 20% higher frequency. When I visited the UK the flicker of discharge lamps was immediately obvious, it took a few days to get used to it. A 120V incandescent lamp, at least of the sort used for general illumination has no perceptible flicker. The one exception is some halogen lamps that had a built in diode so they ran on half wave DC. I think it was to make the filament smaller and thicker to improve optics and raise efficiency.

james_s:

--- Quote from: Gyro on April 04, 2023, 07:35:06 pm ---Leaving aside your irrelevant US political comments... I would have thought that, with your weather switching to shit, increasing wildfires etc, you would want the whole world to have an environmentalist policy!

--- End quote ---

The thing is, the most optimistic data I've seen suggests that with even the most drastic changes to our behavior the situation is essentially hopeless, the damage has already been done and we are around a century too late to do anything about it. I'm all in favor of clean air and water and such, but when it comes to climate change it's an exercise in futility to prevent it. Rather than taking drastic action in hopes of accomplishing something that can't be done, we would be better off putting that effort into mitigating the effects and adapting to deal with them. The climate has changed dramatically over the history of the planet, prior to humans it occurred more slowly and due to natural events, but the changes still occurred. The earth will be fine, it will survive long after we are extinct, and I am pretty confident that at some point, whether in my lifetime or not, there will be a major war or wars that are catastrophic and make human caused climate change the least of anyone's concerns.

As if that wasn't all enough, Europe and the USA could go completely "green" and other places like China, India, Russia, etc will pick up the slack. If we manage to phase out fossil fuels completely, other places will keep using them until we run out. Already a lot of the environmental restrictions have just shifted pollution to China, which I suppose is better for us but not quite the fix we like to think it is.

Simon:

--- Quote from: coppice on April 07, 2023, 06:01:14 pm ---If you look at things from a human centric point of view, far more people die from excessive cold than excessive heat. So, is a modicum of global warming a good or a bad thing?



--- End quote ---

Putting it like that does not make you sound capable of offering anything of value to the debate. People die of more things than the hot or the cold, they die of other things too. Global warming means more than just, we get hotter, it is more accurately called climate change. And yes this is a problem. When your crops don't yield properly because the weather this year was too different to what the plants are used to you have a problem for example.

I got UK runner beans to grow in southern Italy, the first year a total of 3 plants survived with intensive nursing and I got 3 or 6 pods. I ate none of them, I persevered replanting last years seeds and after a decade I had them yielding a small crop "for fun" that provided a couple of meals when grown just like any other plant in the local clay soil rather than the compost in pots with lots of water that they had the first year. Had my life depended on it I would be dead.

Every year we have yet hotter temperatures, globally. Now back in the UK I start to see and hear of temperatures in the UK typical of southern Italy when I lived there 20 years ago, no doubt temperatures in southern Italy are hotter than before.

Not even in the last hottest day ever but the year before that I nearly collapsed due to the heat. It's easier to heat yourself up than it is to cool yourself down, fortunately I could jump into my car and run the air conditioning. - but each to their own crazy assumptions/justifications or religious convictions.

Simon:

--- Quote from: james_s on April 07, 2023, 06:16:54 pm ---
The thing is, the most optimistic data I've seen suggests that with even the most drastic changes to our behavior the situation is essentially hopeless, the damage has already been done and we are around a century too late to do anything about it. I'm all in favor of clean air and water and such, but when it comes to climate change it's an exercise in futility to prevent it. Rather than taking drastic action in hopes of accomplishing something that can't be done, we would be better off putting that effort into mitigating the effects and adapting to deal with them.

--- End quote ---

You almost made the point but then lost it. If as you say the problem started long ago and we should just adapt, then how much adaption do we go through? technologically we will have limits, naturally it will become a matter of cost that no one wants to pay. If we need to adapt to deal with the last 100 years of doing nothing then surely we need to also stop doing whatever causes the problem, soon it will be a 110 year old problem, then a 120 year old problem and so forth. At some point the adaption will be too costly or there are no solutions. I mean what do you do, shoot yourself in the foot and say, It's OK, I have a bandage, put that on then shoot yourself in the foot again?

Zero999:

--- Quote from: coppice on April 07, 2023, 06:01:14 pm ---
--- Quote from: Simon on April 07, 2023, 05:34:02 pm ---I've independently said it many times to try and explain to people that we are not chasing some abstract goal that they must pay for against their will. This is about our survival. We rely on a particular range of habitats, if they change, as adaptable as we may be we won't cope, or least most of us won't which is the scarier option.

--- End quote ---
There are people who have this religious notion that anything we do to change the planet is bad. I guess because this world that incessantly wants to kill you until you protect yourself from its excesses is seen as some kind of natural perfection we can only harm. If you look at things from a human centric point of view, far more people die from excessive cold than excessive heat. So, is a modicum of global warming a good or a bad thing? Species are currently dying off at a fairly rapid pace, but increased CO2 in the atmosphere appears to be increasing the world's plant bio-mass. So, there more living stuff around, but of a narrower range of species. Is that a good or a bad thing?

--- End quote ---
This is true.

Humans will be fine. We live all over the planet from deserts and tundra to rainforests. Higher global temperatures, correlate with more humans not fewer. It's true, if temperatures rise, there will be some parts of the planet which become uninhabitable i.e. due to rises in sea level, but these will be more than outweighed by the areas of tundra and desert (warmer oceans mean more precipitation, not less) which will become suitable for agriculture.

I'm all for conservation and not polluting the planet, but the scare stories are bogus. People want power and manufacturing crises, is a great opportunity to grab more. The last three years has taught me to be very sceptical of "the science" because it's been we've been manipulated and lied to so much by the authorities and mainstream media. Political activism has infected many academic institutions it's difficult to know fact from fiction. Don't get me wrong, I'm not one of those who thinks anthropogenic climate change is a conspiracy theory, but it's not as bad as the authorities lead is to believe.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page

There was an error while thanking
Thanking...
Go to full version
Powered by SMFPacks Advanced Attachments Uploader Mod