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Carlos

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Everything posted by Carlos

  1. So now it'd just be interesting to know which breeds will survive, which will not and what water temperatures those prefer? Will fishing/aquaculture be able to continue in it's present form or will there need to be changes to equipment/boats/fishing grounds and what knock on effects that will mean.....
  2. The increases so far have been pretty even in September to May, and not too much in June/July/August, but I'm not aware of any hard figures on local effects for rainfall intensity and I'd agree that it all comes down to those sort of details. Those are still hard to judge, but, if you are making for 100-200 year plans, you have to take some account for the worst case scenarios too and at least not paint yourself into too much of a corner if they do end up happening.
  3. In some ways though any change is also bad. Whatever the advantages and disadvantages of the current situation, it is what the community has developed to make use of. Any change then means changing a whole raft of related factors, which may not be so bad provided there is enough time, but could be a problem over shorter timescales, both in terms of social change as well as things like cash flow / investment. Average annual rainfall is up 25% in the last 80 years, if that trend continues then we'd hit 1700mm by 2100 and 2200mm by 2200. Those numbers are very different from what we are used to. But as you say, it's easy to make general guesses at global climate change, harder for global weather, and very hard for "local" weather.
  4. I'd agree. I think if you are trying to keep your options open for the 90-190 year timescales then the safe bet is that things will not be the same as now, and your choices maybe start to come down to what kinds of changes you prefer, and the implications that follow on from those.If you look at plant growth globally then rising CO2 does not seem to be a guaranteed advantage overall, but here we are likely more "fortunate", although there may be issues with soil quality/erosion/fertilizer?
  5. Some parts giving you more trees per acre than others likely. So not impossible to do, but filling 1/6 of the land with fast growing trees would be a fair change to the environment......
  6. Back of envelope + 5 minutes on Google says 50,000 planted acres to provide all the power for Shetland. That might be low for the growing conditions and energy use here though and doesn't include anything for powering cars......
  7. What will it be burning in 2100 and at what cost?
  8. Not sure where that'd leave us in the long term.... How would you see Shetland's power generation looking in 2100 say?
  9. Ok, that could be covered under condition 5 (5) Development shall not commence until a construction method statement for the proposed works, including construction and decommissioning, and including access to the site (which shall address the times of year when such works will and will not be allowed to take place) has been submitted to and approved in writing by the Planning Authority I can never find the right minutes of meetings on the council site...... Ah, got it in the end http://www.shetland.gov.uk/coins/viewDoc.asp?c=e%97%9Db%96n%80%8A
  10. Not sure if that is covered anywhere else, but the only mention I see in the planning conditions is "It is requested that a general duty of care is shown when working in this area and that the applicant ensures that all personnel involved in working on this site are briefed on the need to avoid unnecessary disturbance to breeding birds in the area and damage to blanket bog vegetation. " http://www.shetland.gov.uk/planningcontrol/apps/appsdes.asp?Pref=PL2009/355
  11. I've not seen any costings mentioned recently for a Mainland-Yell tunnel, but the distance to cross would seem to make it the same sort of tunnel length as the design looked at for Whalsay, so presumably also the same sort of tunnel cost, if maybe a bit cheaper for the new roads needed. The long term ferry costs on the Yell run might make that tunnel stack up as cheaper, or at least closer to equal than it did for Whalsay, but would still seem to leave us with the "where to find the cash" problem that has been reported by the head of finance?
  12. From an online calculator Fuel is a 3/4 of the cost as a % of your earnings now, than it was in 1960. Other things are a lot cheaper though, so in comparison fuel costs appear higher. Of course then you come on to external costs.....
  13. You are limited to the colours on the list when you apply for planning permission, unless you want to fight your case, but 3 years on and those planning conditions don't apply and you can go wild when shopping for paint - painting your house a different colour doesn't need approval (outside the conservation area). When the SIC is paying for the paint though it's always going to be an "approved colour" - not much point the councillors setting policies if anybody down the SIC chain can go against them. To change policy speak to your councillor
  14. Planning has to approve the colour of a new house, but once it's up, as far as I know, there's nothing to stop you painting it any colour you like..... Cue that Sony "paint explosions" advert.....
  15. Peak coal - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_coal Research in 2009 by the University of Newcastle in Australia concluded that global coal production could peak sometime between 2010 and 2048. although 2150-2200 is a more conservative estimate.
  16. If we are at the peak it means half the oil has gone and if half the fossil CO2 has created a problem the other half will likely not help too much. On the other hand if production has peaked the economic effects will start to dominate the issue....
  17. If you take the SIC report figures as correct http://www.shetlandtimes.co.uk/2010/04/15/whalsay-tunnel-too-expensive-for-council-officials-warn then a tunnel would cost £23M to £28M more over its 120 year life than providing a ferry. Assuming things are more or less even, that would mean that putting on tunnel tolls at about £210,000 per year above current ferry fare income would cover the extra costs......
  18. "A Shetland Bible"? http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0715209159/ref=sib_rdr_dp
  19. Bit more worrying than that - regardless of the issue, or whether it's true or not, we are unlikely to give enough support to action to do anything about it in time.
  20. Game theory on what it would take for enough support for effective action. http://www.pnas.org/content/105/7/2291.full.pdf+html
  21. While this Alarmist/Denier pingpong is all very exciting Maybe we could think about the basic science? Easy enough to show the sea level won't rise at all:- 1- Find a reason why the melting that's happening now won't continue. 2 - Find a reason why there won't be any thermal expansion of the sea from the temperature rise that has already happened.
  22. The tunnel costs in the report for the Whalsay tunnel should give some kind of estimate for tunnel costs to Yell - it's about the same distance involved at least*. The potential savings compared with ferries might vary and so the prefered choice might swing to a tunnel, but it would still seem to leave you with a project cost that is too high to fit in the current capital programme..... * Somebody will know better, but wouldn't a Yell tunnel need to be deeper, and isn't there a minor geological fault to cross too?
  23. Is the resolution good enough to read plates beyond doubt? Of course, even if it is, the obvious solution is to mask your plates before you take a tour of the street. I imagine the answer is "it depends", but if you got 25 or 50% of cars ticketed I would think the parking/no access problem would disappear
  24. No problem once the CCTV is up and running, just a couple of hours running through the week's footage and mailing out the tickets in bulk......
  25. As above, Shetland' grid can't take any more renewable power, it's already got all it can handle, because that's not how it was designed to work. The larger the grid and the more it is designed to run flexibly, the more options you have for mixing different kinds of power supply. The more energy "storage" like hydro-schemes you have in your grid, the more opportunity you have available not to waste output when renewable power gives you electricity at the times you don't need it. Of course if you have a really big grid (crossing time zones) you can just about balance out the power demand too..... That's not anything specifically for/against the windfarm, that's just engineering. Unfortunately a big grid and the kind of co-operation needed to make it all work over a multi-decade timescale seems unlikely to me, so I have to go more with Ghostrider.... we'll keep on nibbling at the edges until the power problems start, and then there'll be a demand for action that will mean new nuclear and/or coal, depending on how public opinion stacks up.
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