"Green" policies are destroying this country

Shoog · 21-11-2023 10:55pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398138#Comment_121398138

We are not breeding beef for domestic consumption and meat eating is in decline anyway. Cutting the beef herd would have almost no impact on imports.

elperello · 21-11-2023 11:00pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398184#Comment_121398184

Yes we are producing for export we could never consume all we produce.

We are also importing, mainly for factory production and the catering trade.

InAtFullBack · 21-11-2023 11:02pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398138#Comment_121398138

There are no shortage of bogwetters commenting on here who would beam with glee if the Irish herd was reduced/eliminated. The fact remains that beef consumption will increase globally regardless - if we don't serve that market, someone else is more than willing to step up and fill the void, namely Brazil and watch Argentina next coming in behind hot on their heels.

Beasty · 21-11-2023 11:11pm

Shoog threadbanned

elperello · 21-11-2023 11:28pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398230#Comment_121398230

I don't know about "bogwetters" whatever they are but no sane person would want to see our national herd eliminated.

Beef production is something we are rightly proud of and we are good at it.

In reality nobody is proposing that we should abandon the business entirely.

What people are saying is that expansion of beef and dairy farming cannot come at the expense of our environment.

We need to listen to their concerns.

21-11-2023 11:37pm

Personally I couldn't give a toss what size this imaginary "national herd" is so long as the emissions from it are reduced.

InAtFullBack · 21-11-2023 11:53pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398406#Comment_121398406

I don't know about "bogwetters" whatever they are but no sane person would want to see our national herd eliminated.

There are plenty who want it reduced, and of those who do there are some who couldn't care less if the Irish cattle farmer was out of business tomorrow morning.

Beef production is something we are rightly proud of and we are good at it.

Agreed.

In reality nobody is proposing that we should abandon the business entirely.

One doesn't have to propose it outright, instead they cheer it on with a death by a thousand cuts approach through increasing regulation, imposing limits and inflating input costs.

What people are saying is that expansion of beef and dairy farming cannot come at the expense of our environment. We need to listen to their concerns.

The figures bandied about in a concerted effort to paint agriculture as a major polluter is akin to a smear campaign. Nowhere are carbon sequestering figures via agriculture taken into account. Hedgerows, grasslands, on-farm trees, etc... all take in carbon. None of this is credited to the farmer.

JRant · 22-11-2023 12:02am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121397762#Comment_121397762

Ah yes, the good old German's. If it wasn't for double standards they'd have none. They bitched and moaned about Ireland's favourable CT rates and saying how unfair it was. Meanwhile, they operate one of the most protectionist regimes when it comes to propping up German companies, despite the EU having strict rules around it.

elperello · 22-11-2023 12:14am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398490#Comment_121398490

I think you are overstating the number of people who are so anti farmer that they want farmers out of business.

They are there all right but not really a threat.

Don't forget that even vegans eat agricultural produce.

Most thinking people understand that farming can be a tough business with long hours and hard work.

They appreciate the link between producer and consumer.

Politically there is also a lot on the plus side for farmers.

We have strong representation from IFA, ICMSA, ICSA etc.

All the big parties in government and opposition are firmly pro farmer.

When it comes to environmental performance there is no smear campaign. We all have to play our part whether we are farmers, businesses or households.

Coolcormack1979 · 22-11-2023 12:40am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398576#Comment_121398576

On every news report or radio farming is mentioned first and foremost.when u have overpaid fools on morning Ireland as a presenter saying farmers should be forced to sell up it is a smear campaign.

elperello · 22-11-2023 12:49am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398642#Comment_121398642

Who said that ?

It doesn't sound like a solution to me because if a farmer sells someone else will be farming the land.

ps200306 · 22-11-2023 1:12am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121393087#Comment_121393087

Just going to leave this here for the nuclear fanboys to think about. Sure it won't change anything but sobering stuff.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121393164#Comment_121393164

My god those numbers are horrific. I knew decommissioning costs were brutal, but I didn't realize it was now as bad as that

I wonder does that figure include the costs of having to store all the waste for a few thousand years or is that something that has to be costed separately

You have to laugh. This is in the same category as "wind is nine times cheaper than gas", the mendacious headline that was bandied around by the Greenies for months after the single day on which it allegedly applied (but never actually did because, as we now know, it was based on a wind auction result that the bidders can't stand over). You see it too with "Irish Energy Bot" which only pipes up when wind has had a good day. The Greenie PR machine is very unsubtle, which it can get away with because its audience by and large is very unquestioning.

So what's the problem with this nuclear decommissioning article? The following, for starters:

it doesn't mention that the costs are spread over 120 years!
the UK's Nuclear Decommissioning Authority is required to apply a discount rate set by the Treasury to its cost estimates. In other words, whenever interest rates are high as at present, the cost estimate skyrockets -- by about 60% since last year.
it singularly fails to mention that three quarters of the cost estimate is for the Sellafield site alone. Sellafield's checkered history includes reactor accidents, plutonium extraction for bomb making, Magnox fuel reprocessing for the UK's idiosyncratic reactor design etc. etc.
2.5% is for Dounreay in Caithness, another government site doing reprocessing, submarine reactor testing, nuclear materials testing, and with its own disgraceful accident history.
Legacy sites going back to the 1940s were all government owned and operated with no thought for future decommissioning. Modern reactors include decommissioning costs in the up front price.
yes, the estimates do include a geological disposal facility, accounting for 8% of total costs.
After Sellafield, Dounreay and the GDF, that leaves just 15% of the total decommissioning cost for all of the UK's reactors. It shows up the "£10 Billion Per Nuclear Reactor" headline as nothing short of an out-and-out lie. None of the reactors is more than a couple of billion even at the current inflated price estimate.

(The 2015 estimates from the NDA).

(P.S. while the decommissioning article is a disappointing screed, it links to this other article by the same author about the "government versus free-market problem" which highlights genuine issues with the nuclear industry's prospects).

Coolcormack1979 · 22-11-2023 7:07am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398667#Comment_121398667

Aine lawlor

m2_browning · 22-11-2023 9:33am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398435#Comment_121398435

Yet you spent pages arguing against nuclear tech which would achieve much larger reductions

elperello · 22-11-2023 10:13am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398859#Comment_121398859

She of Big Week on the Farm and all those shows presented from the ploughing.

Doesn't sound right to me.

Do you know the date of the programme?

m2_browning · 22-11-2023 11:29am

I present the global clean energy index

If you invested in this 10 years ago you be well below inflation

If you invested 2 years ago you be broke

Make sure your pension provider doesn’t put you into the green sucker pot (as some of them are doing) as there is a large Irish pension provider which I will not name who are loudly advertising how green they are on radio and tv

You would be better off burning your money in a stove, or if you bought 3,500 worth of bitcoin this time 10 years ago you would now have 350,000

charlie14 · 22-11-2023 12:06pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398184#Comment_121398184

No idea where you got that idea from.

The OECD FAO 2023 Agricultural Outlook Report is that for the next decade 2023 -2032 beef consumption will increase by 10%

Coolcormack1979 · 22-11-2023 12:08pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121399100#Comment_121399100

The one.it was about 3 Friday’s ago before 7.30 in the morning.just cause she was at the ploughing doesn’t mean she’s on the side of the bold farmer.

charlie14 · 22-11-2023 12:22pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398576#Comment_121398576

Is that a global "we" or just an Irish "we" because where cattle numbers the rest of the world do not give a rats.

Global consumption of beef to rise by 10% over the next decade, consumption of dairy products also to rise for the foreseeable future and while we are cutting our cattle numbers and knocking holes in our economy the rest of the world is increasing theirs to fill the demand.

Where is their any rhyme or reason in that. Are we the only country on the world with animals that emit methane ?

m2_browning · 22-11-2023 12:28pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121399631#Comment_121399631

Et tu?

Glad I am not the only one who noticed the hypocrisy of green tinged authoritarians ignoring the global bit in “global climate change” end of days apocalypse we are told so much about

charlie14 · 22-11-2023 12:43pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121396571#Comment_121396571

I doubt France will be looking to you for your expertise on downtime.

France year on year generates 68 - 70% of it`s electricity regadless of weather and earn €3 Billion annually from exportss. Last year your prediction for the decrease due to downtime for maintenance work was that nuclear generation would drop to 40% or lower for the year. It was 63% and is this year back up to the 68 - 70% normal.

France has recently passed legislation to speed up the addition of 6 new reactors and is condidering adding a further 8. It doesn`t seem downtime is a worry for them.

Pa ElGrande · 22-11-2023 1:13pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398536#Comment_121398536

It seems the ''traffic light'' coalition in Germany lost a court case brought by the opposition that ruled the Greens €60 billion cash grab illegal.

Currently, the off-budget funds exceed the government’s actual budget, coming up to about €869 billion, and are spread across climate funds, energy subsidies, military upgrades and more. Following the court’s ruling, spending from off-budget funds are also halted, except in special circumstances.

While the debt brake has highlighted Germany as one of the strongest European supporters of fiscal discipline, it has also faced considerable backlash. It has been blamed for Germany not being able to borrow enough to invest in the right industries at the right time. source

and

“The real hammer, however, is that the Federal Constitutional Court's decision is likely to affect not only the federal government's so-called 'climate and transformation fund', but also other federal 'special funds' from which the federal government wants to use, for example, electricity subsidies for industry after had first borrowed a lot of money in order to destroy the reliable energy supply in Germany." source

charlie14 · 22-11-2023 1:15pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121399655#Comment_121399655

If the consequences of this insane anti agriculture green ideology were not so dire for framing, the economy and food security you would be tempted to laugh at it.

Still I did get a bit of a chuckle from the idea that a get-around for greens would be that when a dairy cow was no longer productive killing her off and not replacing her would be the way to go. To me it sounded like replacing the term culling with assisted suicide to make it more palatable.

roosterman71 · 22-11-2023 1:23pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121398576#Comment_121398576

There's a huge anti farmer across the board, even before the climate crowd started up. It's always been urbanites looking down their noses at the farmer. Now it's got public backing via media and the huge anti agri movement. There's a big push to reduce the herd, despite it growing by 4% in 50 years. Unlike say, cars. Or air travel. Or people! The department and EU are strangling the life out of it. 2 years ago the slurry produced from a dairy cow was doubled with the stroke of a pen. Happened overnight which meant investments made in the few years previous for storage were now inadequate. Then banding was introduced which again changed the N levels. And then derogation was cut. The result means that business plans made just 3 years ago are worthless. The department and EU are forcing a reduction in stocking rates. The investments in facilities are now out of date and need to be brought up to spec, and if this was done on the back of finance your ability to repay is diminished due to falling stock numbers, falling output prices and higher interest. Death by a thousand cuts is the correct phrase.

Shoog, who is now gone, but I can assume still reads this, thinks beef demand is dropping. A couple of posters have refuted this and they are right. here's the UNs FAO paper - https://www.fao.org/3/CC6361EN/Meat.pdf. Dairy demand also expected to grow - https://www.fao.org/3/CC6361EN/Dairy.pdf

Now, if Ireland is seen as one of the most sustainable places to produce beef and dairy in the entire world, and demand is going to grow, shouldn't we be gearing up to meet that demand instead of downsizing? This is called carbon leakage and is constantly dismissed as a real issue. Someone, somewhere is going to meet the demand.

The last line is far from true. There is a smear campaign against agriculture. The last few pages have been about herd reductions. Before that we'd glee in derogation cuts, despite Teagasc showing that cattle numbers doesn't equate to Nitrates. There's bigger things at play like the management of nutrients, the soil types, the weather. There's more N leaching from tillage than dairy but you don't see the EPA claiming that tillage needs to be reduced. In fact, the government want more of it. It would reduce CO2, but causes other issues. All the while we have the Taoiseach promoting the expansion of flights in Dublin airport by 20%, despite that airport being one of the countries biggest polluters. No one bats an eyelid. Even when Ryanair announced new planes and routes this year, Eamon Ryan was all for it. My God that wouldn't be the case if the farmers of this country came out and said the herd was going to be increased by 20%. It's alright for Brazil to do it though. Leakage.

We've had posters here saying all land should be sold up. We'd others saying smaller farms should be closed to help reduce emissions. Totally went over their head that if a small farm closes, most likely a bigger one takes it over.

Here's where the first mention of Aine Lalors brainfart was mentioned - https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121318312/#Comment_121318312

m2_browning · 22-11-2023 1:26pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121399879#Comment_121399879

It’s worse than that, since we don’t live on a separate planet form other people and countries and climate change is global

the end result of killing cows in Ireland (or whatever other daft extreme green policy is pushed on the heads of the Irish population such as getting rid of cars) is that more than likely countries in poorer global south will chop down rainforests and continue to increase their herd sizes

22-11-2023 2:02pm

The persecution complex of Irelands largest source of emissions is something to behold

"Stop highlighting that we are the largest source of water pollution and emissions in the country, its not fair, you're picking on us"

22-11-2023 2:09pm

The ECB is going to come down hard on banks that don't address shortcomings in their management of climate risk

The ECB has repeatedly warned that lenders aren’t doing enough to prepare for the fallout of extreme weather shocks on asset values, or the risk that clients with big carbon footprints might go out of business. In an interview with Bloomberg in September, the central bank’s top oversight official said penalties are increasingly becoming a preferred tool to enforce compliance in some areas, referring to such measures as a “hammer” that would be “brought down” on banks.

The fines now threatened by the ECB would rack up every day and can amount to 5 per cent of their daily average revenue. For a bank with annual revenue of €10 billion, for example, that would suggest daily penalties of as much as €1.4 million.

It’s the latest sign that authorities in the European Union are stepping up pressure on the financial industry to improve its handling of environmental, social and governance risks. Last month, the European Banking Authority said it was revising the framework that sets industry-wide capital requirements to better incorporate ESG.

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/financial-services/2023/11/22/ecb-threatens-20-banks-with-fines-after-climate-risk-warning/