EU & Brexit Bunker

[First Aspect]

We can still make ICE and electric cars to sell to the EU regardless of whether we harmonise on this point. And the EU can still sell us ICE and/or electric cars depending on our sovereign decision.

Unless you want a land rover or Aston Martin, the options are limited. I was more thinking that we will need to be buying electric cars under a different supply/demand regime than we had hoped. More demand due to UK legislation, less supply due to EU regulation. It's going to keep prices high and perpetuate the offset between EV and ICE costs for longer. I could be wrong.

 

[PurplePenguin]

We need more than "heading in the right direction" Time is of the essence ie we have less than very limited time to address out trashing of the planet and just facing the right direction won't solve anything.

The slower we more the worse the climate damage and the higher the cost (flooding, extreme weather, immigration from areas becoming uninhabitable, health impacts eg as diseases like dengue hit the UK, etc.)

We need ambitious targets. A saying I seem to remember "Aim high. You might miss your target but you won't shoot your foot off".

The EU tends to gloss over the big environmental issues and focus on things like USB-C cables. See also fishing.

 

[Stevo 666]

Unless you want a land rover or Aston Martin, the options are limited. I was more thinking that we will need to be buying electric cars under a different supply/demand regime than we had hoped. More demand due to UK legislation, less supply due to EU regulation. It's going to keep prices high and perpetuate the offset between EV and ICE costs for longer. I could be wrong.

Like I said, we can buy ICE cars from the EU and have plenty of choice. The UK/EU tariff free trade agreement also helps in this respect.

I agree, less regulation will help keep prices down.

 

[Stevo 666]

We need more than "heading in the right direction" Time is of the essence ie we have less than very limited time to address out trashing of the planet and just facing the right direction won't solve anything.

The slower we more the worse the climate damage and the higher the cost (flooding, extreme weather, immigration from areas becoming uninhabitable, health impacts eg as diseases like dengue hit the UK, etc.)

We need ambitious targets. A saying I seem to remember "Aim high. You might miss your target but you won't shoot your foot off".

Technology is the best way to solve this, and there have already been major advances in this area, but governments being governments think that regulation is the only answer. The automotive market is providing an appropriate answer to that if you look at the lack of demand for EVs. There is probably also the realisation in Europe that the Chinese ability to out-compete in the EV car market means that cutting off the ICE market prematurely will have a major negative impact on a major industrial sector in EU.

But anyway, you think that the EU has got it wrong?

 

[bobzmyunkle]

Technology is the best way to solve this

The market?
Alternatively, I used to have regular discussions with a Marxist chap who reckoned ecology was a load of cr*p. If we got socialism it didn't matter if the world was concreted over.

Needless to say I think there's an element of rational choice, a role for government and a need to take climate action a bit more seriously.

 

[Psamathe]

Technology is the best way to solve this, and there have already been major advances in this area, but governments being governments think that regulation is the only answer. The automotive market is providing an appropriate answer to that if you look at the lack of demand for EVs. There is probably also the realisation in Europe that the Chinese ability to out-compete in the EV car market means that cutting off the ICE market prematurely will have a major negative impact on a major industrial sector in EU.

But anyway, you think that the EU has got it wrong?

We have already caused massive damage to our climate. We have the technology we need to stop making things worse (even to improve thnings but that seems off any political agenda).

To wait around for new technology whilst continuing to worsen an already bad situation is just daft.

It's a case of hidden costs vs corporate profits. Climate damage costs us massively eg crop yields, property damage, immigration, health impacts. At the moment corporations want business as usual so they can keep their profits as we will all suffer and pay for the damage. As with eg Ultra-processed foods, self-regulation doesn't work when highest profits are the driving motive.

Hence EU has got it wrong. Time for politicians (incl. in UK) to act in the interests of the real human beings rather than corporations.

 

[bobzmyunkle]

Time for politicians (incl. in UK) to act in the interests of the real human beings rather than corporations.

And there's the rub, as they say.

 

[Stevo 666]

We have already caused massive damage to our climate. We have the technology we need to stop making things worse (even to improve thnings but that seems off any political agenda).

To wait around for new technology whilst continuing to worsen an already bad situation is just daft.

It's a case of hidden costs vs corporate profits. Climate damage costs us massively eg crop yields, property damage, immigration, health impacts. At the moment corporations want business as usual so they can keep their profits as we will all suffer and pay for the damage. As with eg Ultra-processed foods, self-regulation doesn't work when highest profits are the driving motive.

Hence EU has got it wrong. Time for politicians (incl. in UK) to act in the interests of the real human beings rather than corporations.

We are not 'waiting around for new technology', the advances have been on-going for a long time and are happening now. You only need to look a things like power generation, changes in the car market that have already happened and will continue. However setting an arbitrarily short deadline to ban ICE is more ideological that anything else in my view.

All those hydrocarbons will be used eventually, its just a timing difference.

 

[Stevo 666]

The market?
Alternatively, I used to have regular discussions with a Marxist chap who reckoned ecology was a load of cr*p. If we got socialism it didn't matter if the world was concreted over.

Needless to say I think there's an element of rational choice, a role for government and a need to take climate action a bit more seriously.

Seems to me like we are already doing plenty, only Milipeded is on a crusade and taking things a bit too quickly IMO.

 

[Psamathe]

All those hydrocarbons will be used eventually, its just a timing difference.

"Eventually" is a very broad term and over 1000's of years maybe the case. But with regard to Climate Change, timing is crucially important. In UK we are going to miss our emissions targets anyway so we need to be doing more and faster not less and slower.

 

[Rusty Nails]

"Eventually" is a very broad term and over 1000's of years maybe the case. But with regard to Climate Change, timing is crucially important. In UK we are going to miss our emissions targets anyway so we need to be doing more and faster not less and slower.

I seem to remember that a few years ago there was a countdown clock to show we had just months to take action to save the planet.

I admit to knowing little about the science of climate control and prediction and tending to gullibly believe the latest bit of "scientific" research that I see online. What does "timing is crucially important" mean in terms of years or centuries, and exactly how much difference to the timing of the outcome will doing "more and faster" or "less and slower" mean? People tend only to react to firm timescales rather than often differing predictions.

 

[Pblakeney]

People tend only to react to firm timescales rather than often differing predictions.

For all too many the time to take action will be when water is lapping at their front door, and not before.

 

[Rusty Nails]

For all too many the time to take action will be when water is lapping at their front door, and not before.

That may be true, but it is more likely to be the case with vague or non-existant timescales.

 

[AuroraSaab]

I am hopeful of science and technology eventually providing solutions. Unfortunately that seems to move quite slowly, while other techie stuff gallops onward in the other direction. Tiktok has the same carbon footprint as Greece apparently.

 

[spen666]

I am hopeful of science and technology eventually providing solutions. Unfortunately that seems to move quite slowly, while other techie stuff gallops onward in the other direction. Tiktok has the same carbon footprint as Greece apparently.

But far more enjoyable? or far less enjoyable?