skitout (u/skitout) - Readit News

skitout commented on Wind and solar power half the cost of coal and gas, 1/3 the cost of nuclear reneweconomy.com.au/wind-... · Posted by u/doener

bequanna · a year ago

> …and even undercut fossil fuels on price with the addition of energy storage, in some cases.

We should try to do apples to apples here. To match the reliability provided by traditional sources, we need storage.

Any comparison between intermittent and base load generation should always include the cost to make wind/solar reliable.

skitout · a year ago

I agree... but it all depend on the situation. For example, existing power grid, including conventional power plant can take 20% or 30% of intermittent power with close to no extra cost... And the energy mix, the interconnections, the location, the consumption habits all have an impact on the price. Simulation at a grid level, including demand response, thermal storage... can give some precise ideas.

Note that for doing apple to apple we should also include positive and negative externalities

skitout commented on Wind and solar power half the cost of coal and gas, 1/3 the cost of nuclear reneweconomy.com.au/wind-... · Posted by u/doener

egberts1 · a year ago

Those are not baseline power thusly can be very very sporadic (night-time, calm weather).

National security mandates a functional level of baseline power capacity and current green energy diminishes that national security.

So it behoves the power utilities to deploy even more green-energy battery-based storages ... just to shore up the national security.

skitout · a year ago

Security wise, a much more decentralize system have some big advantages...

Yes managing intermittence have a cost, but battery is not the only solution out there.

A good diversified / complementary mix of source of energy reduce the level of the intermittence. Aside of thermal powerplant, some hydropower and biomass can be very flexible for example.

Solar and wind are so cheap now, that it make sense to build more than we need at peak, giving some extra buffer.

You can work on the demand side of electricity. Lowering the peak or making demand more flexible for example.

On the electricity storage, stationary batteries make sometime sense... EV can also play a role. There are also other solution like pumped hydro.

And thermal storage have a huge potential - and it is relatively cheap

skitout commented on Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem idealista.com/en/news/leg... · Posted by u/diggan

giantg2 · a year ago

"My feeling is that your comment ignores this asymmetry."

These are enforcement problems, not squatter problems. As you've said, the things the landlords are doing are already illegal. In the US we have Attorney General offices that will handle housing cases on behalf of tenants.

Both parties can benefit from better enforcement and written and recorded leases. Penalties for landlords leasing without recorded agreements may be more easily enforced that under the current system.

skitout · a year ago

This asymmetry makes enforcement easier when it profits the landlord, and make enforcement more difficult when it benefits the tenant... Your reflection seems based on the idea that there is a symmetry on the enforcement

skitout commented on Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem idealista.com/en/news/leg... · Posted by u/diggan

abduhl · a year ago

The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? This is an extremist view.

Who defines what “maintained” means? Beyond safety concerns about the structure (and even then, they shouldn’t be able to tell me anything as long as I post a danger unsafe structure keep out sign and lock the doors), why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building?

skitout · a year ago

Even if I am the owner of an apartment, I don't have the right to do a metal concert in my living room some Saturdays at 1 am... or don't have the right to paint my frontage the way I want... cause it creates negative consequences for other people.

Having vacant apartments and houses for long time in places where there is an housing shortage create much bigger negative consequences than few metal concerts...

skitout commented on Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem idealista.com/en/news/leg... · Posted by u/diggan

giantg2 · a year ago

It's an illegal operation. Under that sort of restriction, any building occupied would either need to be occupied by the registered owner or have a registered lease. If those aren't found, the people are evicted. The point is to ensure that everyone knows that you need to have a registered document to stay somewhere so nobody takes those deals. Then on the landlord side, you need to enforce substantial fines for any that have offered unofficial leases and surveillance for property owners that have repeat offenses - both to protect the owner from repeated squating and also to catch any owner bypassing the law.

skitout · a year ago

I am volunteering in an housing rights organization in France, and I am and have been tenant in a city with high price and housing shortage.

There will always be many people taking "illegal deal" as sometime you have no other other solution, or other solution are even worse. And many many landlords are doing illegal things, including public housing.

Tenant don't have the same bargaining power / freedom / agency than landlord. Fighting illegal stuff that do landlord is long (usually longer than kicking out a squatter) and difficult. And you have little incentive to do it as a tenant : being in a fight with your landlord = being sure to have problem down the line

My feeling is that your comment ignores this asymmetry.

skitout commented on Squatting in Spain: Understanding Spain's "okupas" problem idealista.com/en/news/leg... · Posted by u/diggan

dgan · a year ago

Oh wow I thought only France has squatting problem. here the squatters can legally occupy your place for 48 hours, and if that's your only place and you went away on vacation tough luck buddy, they can shit on the floor and tear the walls down

Good luck getting your money/property back

skitout · a year ago

1) If it is where you lived they always could be (and were) kicked out quickly (and it was not that simple in other situations)

2) Now the law changed and it is much easier and faster to kick them out. It was always illegal to squat, now sanction are higher

3) Most squatters are not targeting houses. And all the time squats are mainly building not used for years (as it safer and easier for squatters, and sometimes as a way to "minimize" disturbances)

Please note that in Holland some kind of squat were legals for years (only for building not used for years and with obligation to not damage the property and to give it back quickly). Seems interesting to me

skitout commented on I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video] youtube.com/watch?v=4S9sD... · Posted by u/onnnon

bananaflag · 2 years ago

I no longer worry about climate because of AI. I think AI will either save us all or doom us all before the climate doom really starts.

skitout · 2 years ago

We have a lot of existing stuff ("political stuff" like cabron pricing, or "technological" stuff like double glazing or heat pump) that already make sense economically that we don't use fully. How AI deeply impact it ?

skitout commented on I used to not worry about climate change. Now I do [video] youtube.com/watch?v=4S9sD... · Posted by u/onnnon

konschubert · 2 years ago

Im not dang but I would like to share a hypothesis why this maybe isn’t so terrible.

The thing that always stood between the world and climate action was the fact that fossil fuels were the best energy source.

Since a few years, the tables have turned and solar seems to be marching towards absolute dominance.

So there isn’t much to do in terms of political climate action, since the incentives are now mostly economical.

I agree though, the extend to how people are happy to just roll over and accept that the world will go down with them is surprising.

skitout · 2 years ago

1) there are still trillions of "subsidies" (that includes some negative externalities)to fossil fuel each year according to IMF (IMF, not Greenpeace!).

2) Agents in the current system have incentives to prioritize short term benefits over longer term benefits. And a lot of climate related things are short term cost/investment for "profitable" long term benefits ; the current system sucks big time in this configuration.

3) The people having the least negative impact from climate change are the countries emitting the most greenhouse gas. The countries the more negatively impacted by climate change are countries contributing the least to climate change. There is a big misalignment of interest there making a purely "free market" "economical" solution difficult.

4) There are a lot of case in the real world were there is a strong economical incentive to switch to something different and were the different agents just don't... Because people don't want to change, because there can be some particular interest in the system, because of political motive... Human is not a rational animal, and his rationality is not only dictated by money

5) We need to do more than just switching from fossil to "green electricity"

skitout commented on IBM Diversity Efforts Targeted by Stephen Miller's Legal Group news.bloomberglaw.com/dai... · Posted by u/tiahura

rhuru · 2 years ago

Saw the leaked IBM video and it is clearly deeply racist against white people. Glad someone is sueing them.

skitout · 2 years ago

Positive discrimination can see as racist, ok. (even if positive discrimination being here because of negative (generally unconscious) discrimination and because "diversity" is generally good for innovation and competitiveness).

But what here is " DEEPLY racist against white people" ?

skitout commented on IBM Diversity Efforts Targeted by Stephen Miller's Legal Group news.bloomberglaw.com/dai... · Posted by u/tiahura

127361 · 2 years ago

If we're not hiring based on merit then we're destroying the country's global competitiveness against China.

skitout · 2 years ago

Do you agree the important negative (often unconscious, based on cognitive bias) discrimination against minorities is a problem for the country competitiveness ? (negatively discriminated despite "merit")

Do you agree that reducing racial gap and gender gap in USA would be better for the country and its competitiveness ?

I am not a fan of quota, especially taken in isolation... But the underlying issued are huge, for a moral (not everybody have the same moral) but also economic standpoint