Environmentalists vs trains

[MattRat]

Here we go again, spending in England is good, spending in NI is bad. If the objective is to reduce air travel, I fail to see the logic that deems GB air travel to be reduced, yet all the flights from NI to GB are ok.

I don't see how someone who doesn't live in Scotland will be able to get to NI faster by train than by plane. If the Bridge was further south, sure, but the idea was a bridge between Scotland and NI. Also, both nations combined only account for what, 5% of the UK population max?

 

[102 fan]

The fantastic cost would be the reason.

And HS2 is how much?

 

[lachlan]

Without wanting to start a new discussion on the comparative merits of those projects, I recall that most of the serious criticism attracted by the GB-NI fixed link centred on its technical complexity and, as a result, its extraordinarily immense cost.*

It should be noted however that Northern Ireland, like Scotland, receives Barnett consequentials arising from Westminster spending on HS2, though for the life of me I can't find any telling of how much it amounts to at the moment.

* = And also all the unexploded ordnance. But mainly the cost.

I think you're right, and I also don't think anyone believes the link would go ahead. If a proposal was properly costed and evaluated I reckon it would gather more support.

I am sure anyone who opposes HS2 on cost grounds would also oppose the Ireland link, but there are considerably fewer NIMBYs in the area than there are in London and Bucks.

 

[Ianno87]

And HS2 is how much?

Not as much as it would be if even more of it were in tunnel.

 

[HSTEd]

Regarding the suggestions of tunneling the whole of HS2, the tunnels create a lot of emissions during construction so from an emissions perspective it's better to avoid tunnels.

Construction emissions are an irrelevance in tunnel construction.

Consumption of concrete/metal/energy for the TBM pales into insignificance compared to the emissions from burning carbonaceous fuels for energy.

If tunnelling HS2 gets more public transport use, tunnelling HS2 is certainly the green option. Indeed it only has to shift a tiny amount of transport of air traffic or other carbon powered traffic onto rail to be a net benefit, especially given the very long asset lifetime of a tunnel.

Fretting over construction emissions of such schemes is rather like fretting that a project costs a few pounds too much, whilst spending hundreds of pounds a year trying to work around the expenditure.

If we are serious about decarbonisation, almost any fixed infrastructure is worthwhile if it eats into aviation market share.

Sustaining domestic aviation in the UK would require at least 930MWe of electrolysis running day and night, a synthetic fuels plant, and a large carbon capture infrastructure capable of atmospheric capture of ~1.5 million tonnes of CO2 per year.
And energy infrastructure to keep that going.... forever.
[This obviously excludes the flights to the Republic of Ireland]

Or you can build a bridge/tunnel and be done with it.

The crossing is technically challenging but certainly within our engineering capability if someone is willing to pay for it.

 

[D365]

Doing anything (not just rail stuff) is bad from an emissions perspective.
So we'd best just stop doing anything, and watch the country grind to a halt as we die a slow death from starvation and hypothermia...

That’s not a problem, as we’ll all be working from home five days a week and using video conferencing for 100% of all meetings. You know, because the internet consumes absolutely zero energy

 

[Ianno87]

That’s not a problem, as we’ll all be working from home five days a week and using video conferencing for 100% of all meetings. You know, because the internet consumes absolutely zero energy

Nor does our house Central heating, of course.

 

[birchesgreen]

Your laptop probably uses less juice than an EMU though.

 

[Ianno87]

Your laptop probably uses less juice than an EMU though.

My laptop doesn't get used by 1000 people at the same time.

 

[birchesgreen]

My laptop doesn't get used by 1000 people at the same time.

My work laptop is so slow it feels like it

 

[D365]

Your laptop probably uses less juice than an EMU though.

My laptop doesn't get used by 1000 people at the same time.

Hence my reference to the IT infrastructure (servers, routers etc) that is used by hundreds of thousands.

My work laptop is so slow it feels like it

I concur; six minutes gone every morning, plus another ten for updates and five minutes to connect to the VPN from home.

and the numptys are somehow trying to mandate wfh as a solution to replace HS2?

 

[birchesgreen]

Though much of the IT infrastructure will be in use whether people are tapping away in their office in Solihull or their spare room in Shirley.

 

[XAM2175]

Nor does our house Central heating, of course.

Yeah, but my house is a hell of a lot more efficient when it comes to heating because I'm not trying to turn it into the year-round sauna that my office was

 

[Geezertronic]

Paul Bigland's recent blog post highlights some more hypocrisy from the Anti-HS2 so-called "Environmentalists" and is worth a read. From their "gas guzzling" Land Rover, their fire, to their Crowdfunder requests for money for their "full time" activism, it really does make you wonder if these people (and the people that donate to these Crowdfunder requests) actually live in the real world...

 

[Gostav]

According to my observations, on their HS2 Rebellion website the request for donations never stop, this time is £10,000 and more in the past days (also in Extinction Rebellion). In my country people start ask question about the whereabouts of donation funds by countless NGOs.