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from the walking-will-be-mandatory-soon dept.
It's official: France bans short haul domestic flights in favour of train travel:
France has been given the green light to ban short haul domestic flights.
The European Commission has approved the move which will abolish flights between cities that are linked by a train journey of less than 2.5 hours.
[...] France is also cracking down on the use of private jets for short journeys in a bid to make transport greener and fairer for the population.
Transport minister Clément Beaune said the country could no longer tolerate the super rich using private planes while the public are making cutbacks to deal with the energy crisis and climate change.
[...] The ban on short-haul flights will be valid for three years, after which it must be reassessed by the Commission.
"[This] is a major step forward in the policy of reducing greenhouse gas emissions," transport minister Beaune said in a press release.
[...] Sarah Fayolle, Greenpeace France transport campaign manager, told Euronews that there were both "negative and positive aspects" to the European Commission's decision given that only three routes are affected.
"It's going in the right direction, but the initial measure is one that's (not very) ambitious. We must go even further," she said.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday December 25 2022, @08:59PM (7 children)
>We have better risk estimation now.
One would hope so.
>I think they should just build new reactors on the site now.
What you think, and I think, and the best risk estimates available today say, are far less important in the permitting process for new reactor sites than public opinion as expressed to the politicians who have ultimate veto power over any new construction.
Would be cool if "Science" could actually be trusted to get their predictions right and effectively communicated to the public often enough for the public at large to trust Science over reality TV star and other charismatic figures. Cool, but improbable today and apparently getting less likely for the near term future.
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(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday December 26 2022, @04:23AM (6 children)
Which will be fine until the places that don't give public hysteria the same weight have a growing economic advantage over those that do. Constrained democracy isn't mob rule.
Sounds like we've moved to a different set of movable goalposts here. If we can just do stuff without regard to reality, then actual risk doesn't actually matter and your risk/reality based arguments on such can be conveniently ignored.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday December 26 2022, @02:29PM (5 children)
>the places that don't give public hysteria the same weight have a growing economic advantage
The nature of global economics, tragedy of the commons in our atmosphere and oceans, and preponderance of economic history all detract from the credibility of your idealistic statement.
>If we can just do stuff without regard to reality
We have been doing stuff in near total ignorance of reality since forever, case in point maybe since the very beginning of the industrial revolution.
As usual you miss my meaning and pontificate out your own tangent while complaining about goal posts that you think have moved but really haven't outside your personal perception.
What I said (more directly stated for your clearer understanding) was: political hysteria has veto power over the construction of large projects.
Always implicit, but also for clarity: Reality has ultimate say in projects' success and unintentional consequences.
Our limited knowledge of reality is improving, particularly when large unintentional consequences like Fukushima happen. However, it's not a steady forward march, particularly when "Science" is funded with the aim of influencing the powerful political hysteria rather than establishing better knowledge of reality.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday December 26 2022, @03:59PM (4 children)
How? I say the opposite routinely happens even in your examples. For example, offshoring. Global economics shows that if you can't do X in country Y, then you often can move production to country Z and skip the public hysteria. Even with nuclear power, France allows plenty of it even if Germany happens to think it's scary-dangerous. And there's plenty of other examples such as rare earths mining, textiles, or earning revenue free from excessive taxation. That checks off both global economics and preponderance of economic history BTW.
And there's a fair number of entertainers and protesters who operate by generating shock (Satanists, fruit mashers, flag burners). Or merely belong to an unpopular minority (Jews, Blacks, rich people). Or use recreational drugs, keep and bear firearms, prostitutes, hobby chemistry kits, or any number of unpopular or scary-dangerous activities.
Going back to nuclear power, public hysteria drives some really bad decisions like not making safer nuclear power plants because the existing ones are dangerous. You noted at one point that existing nuclear plants were operating past their expected life span. Well, the big reason why is that in many countries, new reactor construction has been effectively halted by public hysteria - for example, US, Japan, and Germany. So when you can't build new plants, but your country desperately needs the power from existing plants, then you get the situation where existing plants are run well beyond their design lifespan.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday December 26 2022, @08:35PM (3 children)
And France sure is kicking Germany's ass, economically...
>public hysteria drives some really bad decisions
100% agree, but... That doesn't change the real world power it wields.
>new reactor construction has been effectively halted
Since the 1-2 punch of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, the growth rate of nuclear power plants world wide basically flat-lined.
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(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday December 26 2022, @09:19PM (2 children)
In March, 2022 Germany had household electricity prices [statista.com] of $0.46 per kWh and France $0.19 per kWh. There's much more to economics than that, but it is a huge advantage.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday December 26 2022, @09:42PM (1 child)
And Tennessee has super low prices due to installed hydro... Cheap electricity is nice, it makes it cheaper to run trains for one thing....
But, overall... Neither Tennessee nor France nor Venezuela are impressing me with how they are using their cheap energy to kick economic ass on neighbors with higher energy prices.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday December 27 2022, @04:12AM
You ever going to make a point with that?
So what? I didn't say that price of electricity was the only relevant economic data point. But the take home is that Germany would be doing considerably better with a more sensible and cheaper electricity policy. Say like Texas is.