203 Comments

I want to treat this climate story a bit like an open thread and ask for advice:

I've been slow-charging an electric car at home since November. It's worked well enough so far, but we do need to add more range often enough that it's time to get a Level 2 charger at home.

Is there a good reason to get a wall-mounted charger versus just getting a portable Level 2 and leaving it plugged into the garage outlet? Are the charging losses less on a hardwired system? Or are there other benefits?

Expand full comment

I don't fully recall how we researched it. I think it came down to wanting to modernize the house a little and add some goodies for selling it if that ever becomes a Thing, God/dess forbid. So we installed a charger as a feature, because we were going to get solar panels anyway and it wasn't outrageously expensive as add-ons go. The other thing was I'm not crazy about daisy- chaining anything I in an electrical circuit if I can avoid it.

HTH. I'm sorry I don't recall more than that.

Expand full comment

That's helpful actually!

Expand full comment

Ta, Dok. Biden is a climate hero.

Expand full comment

All I'ma say is I'm really glad I no longer live and work in Death freaking Valley.

Expand full comment

“Biden proposes new standards to protect workers in heat,”

But what about the children?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8rlXeQzA5I

Expand full comment

"I was crowned with a spike right through my head...yeah yeah yeah..."

- stones

Expand full comment

And as for the LNG decision, if the spike in LNG exports / profitability was due to Russian oil coming off the market, and is now also being offset by increased green energy development in Europe ... do any of those rosy economic forecasts for new plant proposals include what the impact of mothballing all those brand new plants will be when the price of LNG falls below whatever profitability metric they are including in their estimate?

I bet not.

If you justify a plant or a well or a pipeline on "hundred dollar oil" (a common metric in Canada) and you have $60 dollar oil for years instead, the economic outlook is for shit.

Expand full comment

"Some OSHA Rulles"???

- was hoping for a clever pun I didn't get ... but I don't get it.

Expand full comment

I was trying to come up with something about Stephanie Ruhles, but I don't like her enough to try harder. She screams over her guests and can't ask a question without giving a speech that makes it clear there is a Right Answer. And she's desperate for personality conflict over policy evaluation. I would lay money she was the Mean Girl in 8th grade.

Expand full comment

Ah. As I said, I just didn't get it....

Expand full comment

"Hot out therre," too.

Expand full comment

Last week my wife and I took the Cog Railway up Pikes Peak. Sitting opposite us was a couple from Dallas-Fort Wirth. I think he worked management in the oilfields. She had no idea Abbott had signed legislation forbidding cities and counties from requiring water breaks. I said, "You might want to check that out." She said they considered moving to Durango but she didn't want to leave her church. I knew right then where she was getting her news.

Expand full comment

I don’t understand how LNG exports became a cause celebre for republicans. Shouldn’t American fossil fuels be consumed right here in America instead of foreign countries?

Expand full comment

Money for their oil company patrons, which means money for their campaigns, which means a safe reelection in their gerrymandered district. And a continued hold on power.

Expand full comment

Now that he has the power, Biden needs to rein in these rogue justices like Federal judge whatshisface up there. This is a nation of laws, and the law now says the President rules as a king.

Expand full comment

If you are referring to Justice Keg Stand then you misspelled "What? Shitfaced!"

Expand full comment

Mr I really like beer.

Expand full comment

I was referring to judge Cain in the LNG decision, but yeah, Boof as well.

Expand full comment

I knew that, but I never let knowledge get in the way of trying to make a joke. ;-)

Expand full comment

When your rules have two els, does that mean they are stricter than regular rules?

Expand full comment

Ileegal Regulashuns!

Expand full comment

Serious question: when do we start developing livestock and wildlife cooling centers, because warming is going to hurt certain species or impact their behavior, too?

Expand full comment

Guess we'll need to eat 'em all up now before they get too stringy and tough.

Expand full comment

Wildlife will try to migrate to better living conditions. But that can take hundreds or thousands of years since they are adapted to a specific environment and 200 miles north may not have the vegetation or terrain they are adapted for. The vegetation moves even slower and the terrain takes eons to change, other than coastline washed away by rising sea level and more intense storms. Even prey sources must be included in the mix. They cannot adapt in just 50 or 100 years. Plus for species that inhabit lower mountain terrain, eventually they can only move up so far before they give out of mountain. It can take hundreds or thousands of years for a complete habitat overhaul, including insects, burrowing animals, grazers, predators, plants, water resources, and other factors that allow compete ecological systems to migrate 500 miles north. I doubt the melting tundra in Canada and Alaska is going to see huge fields of wheat planted in the next 200 years, even if the climate permitted it. A melted mix of water and dirt is basically land that cannot support a person walking across it, much less heavy farming equipment. As seen by sinking houses, roads, and sidewalks built on frozen ground in Alaska when it starts melting Meanwhile our Great Plains may be unsuitable for any agriculture, too hot and water resources depleted or polluted.

Besides, Canada might build a wall to keep all those murdering, raping, drug dealing Americans out.

Expand full comment

Meanwhile, invasive species are having a field day with their expanding range. Last I heard, those pythons that started out in the Everglades have made it as far north as the Florida panhandle and southern Georgia.

Expand full comment

I don't know how to help wildlife overall, but some livestock have access to things like misting stations. And most (decent) farmers purposefully plan shady areas for animals to retreat to when needed. Even a beef cattle farmer knows that a dead cow isn't going to make them any money, so they do what they can to ensure the general wellbeing of their livestock while they have them.

(I am not going to touch on the factory farms here where chickens or pigs are literally cooked alive in cramped quarters during heatwaves, because I prefer not to spend my last bit of sanity on that.)

Expand full comment

That longer headline still has the "workers in heat" part though, so I'm not sure it's any more respectable. lol

Expand full comment

Well, it's Hump Day, so of course!

Expand full comment

"Trump is a rapist" Media: Shrug. "Trump has been convicted of 34 felonies" Media: Shrug

"Trump's name is all over Epstein documents" Media: Yawn.

"Joe doesn't do well at debate" Media: OMG! Step down. Ahhhhhhh!

Expand full comment

WHY THE FUCK ISN'T DOJ LOOKING INTO THIS EPSTEIN SHIT HAVE WE JUST COLLECTIVELY DECIDED TRUMP IS A SPECIAL BOY WHO GETS TO RAPE KIDS???

Sorry for the All Caps, this is just fucking crazy town.

Expand full comment

Rich men, especially but not limited to rich white men of any political persuasion, get to rape, kill, and steal with impunity.

.

I am trying not to fill up with despair when I remember what i had hoped for in retirement and what I am actually experiencing now as I hurtle toward it, and how it might only be a hellscape going forward. There is so much wrong with this country, I sometimes hate that hope is still alive. Because it means that those of us who care will have to do more than we have energy, money, or time to fix. So I might never see women with rights again, a female President, the ERA in the Constitution, science being respected more than faith, or enough climate change action, and all of this will almost certainly shorten my life and the lives of billions. Sorry I don't have any words of courage at the moment.

.

(without apology needed for the all caps) SCREAMS INTO THE VOID

Expand full comment

dawG I hate repeating this but it is so very true.

IOKiffYAR*

* iff = if AND ONLY if

Expand full comment

Two words. Merrick Garland. The same reason no one is investigating four years of corruption by Trump and his associates prior to November 2020. Even waiting to appoint a special counsel and start a serious investigation of leadership for 1/6 for a year and a half after he took office.

Expand full comment

It was an official act or something.

Expand full comment

It's because there are more people involved than loser, many more.

Expand full comment

Then fuck 'em. If they were innocent passengers on the plane that knew nothing, then fine. Otherwise, charge the fuck out of these creeps. I don't give a shit if this takes down Bill Clinton.

Expand full comment

Agree 100%.

Expand full comment