"Green" policies are destroying this country

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915493#Comment_120915493

I'd look at it differently. The congestion charges could be used to fund the rollout of said alternatives at a greater speed.

Saying we have to wait and roll out alternatives first allows a cop out in so far as where do you draw the line and say we have enough alternatives.

Right now in Galway for example, for anyone living and working within the city boundary there are several alternatives (bus, walk, cycle). For those coming from outside the city, sure, the options are lacking but given the CiCo have been talking about P&R's for nearly 30 years without even having chosen sites then a bit of pressure from commuters on both elected officials and the CiCo/CoCo wouldn't go amiss.

Right now there is no pressure hence the lack of options.

WishUWereHere

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915626#Comment_120915626

You really serious? Use the takings from CC’s to fund infrastructure? Talk about putting the cart before the horse.

Ramasun

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915483#Comment_120915483

Unless you ban imports there will be cheaper goods coming in. Even then there is limit to what people will pay before switching to alternatives or growing their own.

Your analysis is long but very flawed, needs some macro economic insights.

Akrasia

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120914960#Comment_120914960

Patrick Moore

This fellah who said you could safely drink glyphosate when shilling for chemical companies

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovKw6YjqSfM

He has made an absolute fortune shilling for the fossil fuel Industry.

Why should people believe his analysis on the greens?

A 'brave New Green World by any means deemed necessary'

Would you listen to yourself

ZookeeperDub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915492#Comment_120915492

As I said I already answered the questions you asked multiple times. You have ignored the answer.

As you have failed to answer I think we can all come to our own conclusion on the 3.5 Bn nonsense you posted multiple times. Claiming it came from the report as well 🙄

marno21

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915373#Comment_120915373

Which cities would you advocate foisting this policy on? Just Dublin and Cork?

ZookeeperDub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915493#Comment_120915493

Unfortunately it won't work like that. You could build all of the above and people will still use their car. You have people in Dublin with buses driving right past their door and they will still use a car.

I expect once the bus connect is in place they will push for a congestion charge. I expect it to be approved as well no matter which party is in government.

The bus lane enforcement is a huge project which has very little focus, bus connect will fail if they can't keep cars out of bus lanes and we don't have Gardai to sit on every bus lane stopping cars. Drive around Dublin now and the bus lanes are a joke with cars. I would also dump out taxis from them from 7-9 and 4-7 each day Monday to Friday

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915698#Comment_120915698

Not really, the CC would help fund improvements. Fairly standard, otherwise we will be here in 50 years time still discussing how to build public transport.

charlie14

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915867#Comment_120915867

Stop with the childish bluffing. You have not answered anything you have been asked, and certainly nothing to economically justify a Letterkenny/ Derry rail link at any cost.

As you have appear to have missed it, I said I`m not in any rush, take as long to answer that as you need. But after answering all your questions with you refusing to answer anything you have been asked, fair imo not to keep playing your little avoidance games until you do.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915698#Comment_120915698

Given that it's the norm worldwide I don't see anything earth shattering

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915879#Comment_120915879

The 5 cities, Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway & Waterford. To start with anyway. No reason not to roll it out to the larger towns later on

Pa ElGrande

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120914626#Comment_120914626

The title of the thread is "Green" policies are destroying the country. All political parties have "Green" policies not just the "Ecology Party of Ireland" who following the success of Petra Kelly in Germany rebranded themselves as the Green Alliance (direct translation = comhaontas glas) and the Green party. The German Green party is the most successful, Irish Greens take their lead from Alliance 90/The Greens (Bündnis 90/Die Grünen) right down to their manifesto "The future is green". The Irish Greens have bound their identity to this, and they hold ministerial posts in the current government, they are legitimately going to attract the bulk of criticism and in particular due to post held by Eamon Ryan.   

Populist parties like FF & FG follow the money, they also have "Green" policies. Led by these parties previous administrations, Irish people have voted to surrender autonomy to the EU, as a consequence the leaders of these parties have signed the population up to 3rdparty agreements with no say from the electorate. Bertie Ahern, 1997, Kyoto Protocol and Enda Kenny, 2015, Paris agreement. Irish MEPs recently voted for the nature restoration law, without approval from the electorate, this law is a gross violation of property rights, the property owners must now be coerced into accepting this.

The upshot of "Green" policies is that populations in each EU state are today subject to central planning and have been assigned targets reminiscent of the 5 year "Gosplan" of the Soviet era. The outcome is predicable, the bureaucrats will lie and cheat while lining their pockets, the "Nomenklatura" will fly to Davos is private jets.  Those of us who disagree must pool together and reject "green" policies, while we don't, us plebeians must work harder to pay more "carbon" taxes while increasingly accepting less access to resources and limited freedom of movement. 

At its core the Green movement wants to reverse the Industrial revolution, which they see as the original sin of modern civilisation for unleashing global, self-sustaining economic growth they claim is destroying the planet. As humans we all live in an environment, logically noone on this thread is anti-environment. We do disagree on the anti-human tendencies manifested by the environmentalist movement, wanting to protect our life support systems and improve our standards of living does not make us anti-environment. The vision of the environment presented by Irish Greens is that rural Ireland must become a wildlife theme park as seen on national geographic, it ignores the reality that the landscape seen in Ireland today is entirely shaped by humans and has been for the last 8,000 years. This is why their core support are wealthy middle class urban voters, the Greens as a political party only exist because of human populations increasing wealth and standards of living bought about by the industrial revolution.

All this crap about net-zero is just a wish list drawn up by rent seekers implementing unreliable energy generation schemes that offload costs of their schemes onto consumers while the profits go to the rent seekers. The realisation is now dawning that, like everything else, "renewables" need cheap hydrocarbon fuels. The offshore wind turbine developers are retreating due to the explosion in costs of their inefficient technology and trying to hold governments to ransom because "targets".  Mis-allocation of resources always leads to a bust and no central planner can prevent that, politicians do not make good stewards of economies as Enoch Powell observed "All political lives, unless they are cut off in midstream at a happy juncture, end in failure".

Akrasia

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120916327#Comment_120916327

Yeah. It's like a pavlovian response.

Ultra libertarians whittering about taxes and property rights in response to any suggestion that maybe we shouldn't use the commons as a perpetual dumping ground for industrial waste

marno21

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120916321#Comment_120916321

I take it you’ve never been to Waterford in that case. A small, low density city, with nowhere near the population for mass transit, with very little congestion and struggling economically needs congestion charges.

This is nothing except “I hate cars”.

deholleboom

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120916327#Comment_120916327

VERY well put!

JRant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915373#Comment_120915373

Considering that you don't live in a city I'm sure it's a fantastic idea for you. Let's put it to the vote for the people in those affected cities and let democracy do it's thing.

JRant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120916739#Comment_120916739

You need to remember the first rule of the greenies, "if it moves, tax the shïtê out of it". Forget about having a well thought out, budgeted strategy, it's hand straight into the pocket, every time.

Geuze

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120869131#Comment_120869131

I still can't understand how a utility-scale solar farm works in Ireland.

I mean just look out the window today, in July!!

Cloudy and raining!!!!

ZookeeperDub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120916110#Comment_120916110

So much for not responding. Anyway post #24857 along with others made my comment on the train link. Of course this was in response to the cost been 3.5bn according to you.

Now maybe you can answer how you came up with that number as you claimed on numerous posts it was from the report. If you could clear that up it would be fantastic.

ZookeeperDub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120917048#Comment_120917048

Solar still working in rain and cloud. Of course the production is down but it will still work.

ZookeeperDub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120917032#Comment_120917032

Again with the "greenies", the majority of taxes currently in Ireland have been implemented by parties other than the Green party.

Which party do you think has the following as their main agenda as part of Green agenda for last election

1. Ban all fracking
2. Terminate all peat and coal electricity production
3. No new licenses for drilling on or off shore. No exploration at all allowed
4. Divest out of fossil fuels
5. A transition force to move to renewables

tom1ie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120915607#Comment_120915607

Lads with no brains.

WishUWereHere

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120916279#Comment_120916279

One huge difference, most other cities using a CC have better public transport - underground etc. only thing this country seems to be good at is holding inquiries about inquiries.

charlie14

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120917138#Comment_120917138

Whenever you are ready to give your economic justificaton for spending €200- €300 Milion for a rail link between Letterkenny and Derry that would not just be fantastic, as you have to date refused to answer anything you have been asked, it would be unique.

But as I said, I`m in no rush. In your own good time.

Thanks in anticipation.

charlie14

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120917143#Comment_120917143

A broken clock is correct twice a day, but other than that it is not adding much

JRant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120917168#Comment_120917168

You seem to have misunderstood me. I'm not solely talking about the green party. It's "green" policies and they are all guilty of it.

ZookeeperDub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120917672#Comment_120917672

Sorry I did misunderstand you.

ZookeeperDub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120917585#Comment_120917585

As I said already the investment in public transport is required and Ireland needs to connect the entire island with a rail network. Have posted this multiple times yet you seem to ignore. If you don't like the answer that makes no difference to me but claiming I haven't responded is odd carry on

Any explanation on why you posted multiple times claiming the report said it was 3.5 bn?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120916739#Comment_120916739

Strange how there are multiple local bus routes in operation then if it doesn't have the population for it

This is nothing except “I hate cars”.

Not at all, owned one for many years, still use GoCar on the very rare occasion when a car is the best option.

I just don't think they should have free reign in the cities anymore.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120917048#Comment_120917048

and yet the sun still shines

Pa ElGrande

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120917048#Comment_120917048

One of the problems with both wind and solar is their intermittency. You cannot go to a solar panel operator and say I want 150 MW for delivery between 8AM and 10PM on September 1st, they cannot guarantee that, when they can't, another generator has to make up the difference or the grid collapses. Over the course of a year in Ireland solar capacity factor is 11%, onshore wind is typically under 30% and offshore wind typically under 40%. Capacity factor being calculated as actual energy generated (MWh) over Capacity(MW) x time period (h). Solar is particularly bad because the reliable generators need to be switched off as it comes online and switched on again as it disappears, every day, this leads to phenomenon called the duck curve. Because of the short winter days it's practically non-existent from the end of September to March, during the coldest months of the year when we need most energy, it does not matter how many unreliable generators there are the Irish electrical grid is entirely dependent on gas and coal, diesel + some inter-connectors for reliable operation. Even if these genators are not operating, they must be staffed and equipment maintained with fuel supply contracts, that cost is worked into your electricity bill as are the grid balancing costs.

At most all these do, is defer when the gas or coal is burned, they cannot eliminate it from the grid. There is a looming problem with gas supply in Ireland, the Corrib field will be exhausted by the end of the decade, there is no gas storage reservoir in Ireland leaving the country entirely dependent on supply from the Moffat gas line from Scotland (gas from North Sea, Norway and LNG). Gas is used for domestic heating, cooking and electricity generation in this country. The nightmare scenario that has a high probablity to unfold is that of severe Winter cold which could last up to 6 weeks (Winter 2009 & 2010 had sever cold spells , 1962-63 winter, or February/March 1947.) These weather systems tend to hit across a wide swath of Western Europe at the same time, driving up the demand for energy at once. In a prolonged severe cold spell scenario, the probability of a gas supply emergency increases and since linepack pressure needs to be maintained, some pipelines will be shut off while demand is at peak. Fortunately we don;t often get these and we got lucky last Winter it was relatively mild. We need our luck to hold out again this coming Winter.

When the solar and wind turbine operators do not perform, other suppliers must step in, they demand a premium price. Next time you hear a wind or solar industry spokesman boast about levelised cost of electricity (LCOE) metrics, you must realise they don't bear the cost for their non-performance, you do, and it is reflected in your electricity bills.