Of course the 2 state solution is dead. There are not two states to do a deal. Israel has occupied and chopped up the West Bank - partly for justified security reasons, partly for religious nut job reasons. And Gaza is a terrorist enclave.
Is not the simple truth that the 2 state solution was never on because the Muslim crazies cannot sanction the Jewish state, and the Jewish crazies are happy to replicate terror with terror of their own.
The crank left repeat the end game: from the river to the sea. A one state solution- the creation for the first time of a Palestinian nation state where Israel now is. So park holier-than-thou we are the oppressed the Jew uniquely is Bad no that isn’t anti-Semitic cos the Jeremy wasn’t how dare you bullshit from the crank left. They don’t want 2 states, they want to remove Israel from existence.
Worse for Israel, remove them from the map is the policy of Iran, Lebanon, Syria, Hamas, Hesbollah, Islamic Jihad etc etc etc. the idea that Israel is the aggressor doesn’t stand up to logic or sanity.
No, and I don’t think this sort of dismissive simplification helps.
We have been much closer to a working 2-state solution in the past. I don’t see the evidence that is was “never on”. Whether it is feasible now after years of continued Israeli settlements in the West Bank is a harder question.
Happy to debate it! My “never on” point was that even back in 2000, the proposed Palestinian state wasn’t acceptable to the Palestinians who preferred war to compromise. The risk to Israel from the Palestinians was the driver of the Israeli demands for compromise, as then demonstrated by the Palestinian switch from peace negotiations to war.
If a viable state couldn’t be founded then, I can’t see how it would be founded now. And again, it is difficult to do so when the elected government is pledged to the destruction of the other state, a position shared by surrounding countries like Iran.
We can’t just give the Israeli governments permission do what they like - some of their acts have been wilfully criminal. But I can understand their position better when most of their neighbours and the counterparty in a 2 state negotiation are pledged to their destruction
What’s telling is that within hours of news of the attacks by Hamas, well before any Israeli retaliation, large numbers of people were out demonstrating - against Israel.
That can only be explained by deep-rooted anti-semitism among those protestors.
"From the River to the Sea". The crank left blame the Jews for violence against Jews. Every pogrom in history is the fault of the victims, the jews bring it on themselves.
Look at the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign statement when Hamas brought medieval slaughter into Israle. No condemnation of beheading babies, no no, its the Jew's fault, and that the just thing to do is to stand in solidarity with the Hamas beheaders. https://palestinecampaign.org/psc-statement-on-escalation-of-violence/
If that isn't anti-semitism, what is?
I wonder if there’s something in the human brain that predisposes us to loathe Jews. Occasionally, I’ve found myself thinking nasty thoughts, before the rational part of my brain kicks in and says, “Why are you thinking that?”
Personally, I find antisemitism quite baffling. While I can understand, though of course not condone racism as fear of those who look different, and xenophobia and religious intolerance as fear of those who behave differently, I can see no reason why Jews should be singled out for hatred any more than any other group. I simply don't understand why just being Jewish appears to provoke such strong antipathy in so many people. Although I am atheist and find all religion a bit weird, I don't find Judaism any odder or more threatening than other religions.
At any rational level, anti-semitism is absurd.
Racism may or may not be rational. When two ethnic groups compete for land and resources, racism is rational, if nasty.
But anti-semitism appeals at the emotional, sub-conscious level.
The antisemitism of a Palestinian (and more generally in parts of the Arab world) could be termed rational on this distinction.
Anyone who thinks the antisemitism of the Islamic world is rooted in the Palestinian cause needs their head examining.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The Government is full of lawyers and PPE people. It's a specialised mindset that prioritises intangibles (narratives and ideas) over tangibles (facts). If they want to find a source to prove X, they'll find one. They're not stupid and if you're looking for somebody to defend you from murder or cite the bloody Laffer curve, they're brilliant, which is why they earn the big bucks. But they're exactly the wrong people to build a bridge or create a national infrastructure. For this you need blokes in brown coats and bright boys and girls in blue overalls who can put a hammer to a nail. People who would have turned down hydrogen in ten seconds, and that includes the pizza.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
Nah, it's easy. Just line the entire gas network with unobtanium.
What do you mean, boffins? Unobtanium doesn't exist? Go away and invent it. Naughty boffins.
After all, the alternatives all involve doing things that are technically possible, but inconvenient.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
I'd rather have a hydrogen boiler than a bloody air source heat pump.
Never mind the government, the industry is gearing up for hydrogen.
It's interesting the Con and the SNP have gone down the tubes at the same time?
Both have been hit by the Labour revival under Starmer.
The SNP are helped too by blaming a Tory government at Westminster for Scotland's problems and the Conservatives as in 2015 can be boosted in England by raising the risk of a weak UK Labour minority government reliant on a strong SNP for confidence and supply
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
The Japanese have been doing interesting development of green CH4 (using an ancient method) for home heating etc purposes.
CO2 + 4x H2 = CH4 + 2x H2O
It's an inefficient method, but it's infinitely safer than pumping hydrogen into homes.
And if it's done using surplus energy that would go to waste otherwise, eg on very windy days when there's limited demand, then it might be viable.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
Nah, it's easy. Just line the entire gas network with unobtanium.
What do you mean, boffins? Unobtanium doesn't exist? Go away and invent it. Naughty boffins.
After all, the alternatives all involve doing things that are technically possible, but inconvenient.
I had my annual boiler service recently and asked the guy what was happening with domestic heating just as 'something to ask'. He was 100% on Hydrogen being The Future and reassured me that my boiler would already work with it.
About two weeks later I had to get someone else out as the boiler stopped working and the guy was horrified that the previous one had missed a component which was under a recall from the boiler manufacturer which was A Serious Issue (and thankfully free replacement). I thought I'd ask him the same question about domestic heating. He went on a some length about various governments messing about, then paused and said 'So mate - f*ck knows.'
Indications are emerging that they plan to cut IHT and/or Stamp Duty next Spring. That would be electioneering in its purest form.
Expect plenty of that in the next year.
Or Rishi Sunak really is a "useless" politician.
I'd love to see him run things calmly for this final year, do no harm, just keep the seat warm for SKS, but I guess that's not how the world works. GEs are what politics is all about once they get close. So I do cut him some slack. He has to give it everything, leave nothing on the pitch between now and next October. He has to somehow turn it around and avoid a real thrashing. Perhaps he can. 200 seats is the magic number. This is what Sunak will be aiming for and who's to say he can't do it?
I suspect CON supporters will typically privately be hoping for 250 min and would take that now. I would.
In terms of whether Starmer is a one term or two term PM who the Tories pick as next leader is far more significant than their seat count after the election. In 97 the decision by Hezza nor to stand and the choice of Hague over Clarke guaranteed Blair a second term. Tories were more interested in their factional divisions then being electable. They repeated the trick in 2001 with IDS leaving Howard to sort of sort things out and minimise the damage in 2005.
The sure sign of the Tories wishing to seriously compete in 2028/9 would be electing Mordaunt despite her supposed wokeness. Badenoch or Braverman would be Hague/IDS redux.
Blair would have beaten Clarke or even Hazza comfortably in 2001 too as the economy was strong.
The rightwing Thatcher however beat the centrist Callaghan in 1979 as the economy was weak.
What the economy looks like under a Starmer government would be far more significant than who the next Tory leader is.
Remember too even Howard won most votes in England in 2005, helped by Labour defections to the LDs over the Iraq War
Of course the 2 state solution is dead. There are not two states to do a deal. Israel has occupied and chopped up the West Bank - partly for justified security reasons, partly for religious nut job reasons. And Gaza is a terrorist enclave.
Is not the simple truth that the 2 state solution was never on because the Muslim crazies cannot sanction the Jewish state, and the Jewish crazies are happy to replicate terror with terror of their own.
The crank left repeat the end game: from the river to the sea. A one state solution- the creation for the first time of a Palestinian nation state where Israel now is. So park holier-than-thou we are the oppressed the Jew uniquely is Bad no that isn’t anti-Semitic cos the Jeremy wasn’t how dare you bullshit from the crank left. They don’t want 2 states, they want to remove Israel from existence.
Worse for Israel, remove them from the map is the policy of Iran, Lebanon, Syria, Hamas, Hesbollah, Islamic Jihad etc etc etc. the idea that Israel is the aggressor doesn’t stand up to logic or sanity.
No, and I don’t think this sort of dismissive simplification helps.
We have been much closer to a working 2-state solution in the past. I don’t see the evidence that is was “never on”. Whether it is feasible now after years of continued Israeli settlements in the West Bank is a harder question.
Happy to debate it! My “never on” point was that even back in 2000, the proposed Palestinian state wasn’t acceptable to the Palestinians who preferred war to compromise. The risk to Israel from the Palestinians was the driver of the Israeli demands for compromise, as then demonstrated by the Palestinian switch from peace negotiations to war.
If a viable state couldn’t be founded then, I can’t see how it would be founded now. And again, it is difficult to do so when the elected government is pledged to the destruction of the other state, a position shared by surrounding countries like Iran.
We can’t just give the Israeli governments permission do what they like - some of their acts have been wilfully criminal. But I can understand their position better when most of their neighbours and the counterparty in a 2 state negotiation are pledged to their destruction
What’s telling is that within hours of news of the attacks by Hamas, well before any Israeli retaliation, large numbers of people were out demonstrating - against Israel.
That can only be explained by deep-rooted anti-semitism among those protestors.
"From the River to the Sea". The crank left blame the Jews for violence against Jews. Every pogrom in history is the fault of the victims, the jews bring it on themselves.
Look at the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign statement when Hamas brought medieval slaughter into Israle. No condemnation of beheading babies, no no, its the Jew's fault, and that the just thing to do is to stand in solidarity with the Hamas beheaders. https://palestinecampaign.org/psc-statement-on-escalation-of-violence/
If that isn't anti-semitism, what is?
I wonder if there’s something in the human brain that predisposes us to loathe Jews. Occasionally, I’ve found myself thinking nasty thoughts, before the rational part of my brain kicks in and says, “Why are you thinking that?”
Personally, I find antisemitism quite baffling. While I can understand, though of course not condone racism as fear of those who look different, and xenophobia and religious intolerance as fear of those who behave differently, I can see no reason why Jews should be singled out for hatred any more than any other group. I simply don't understand why just being Jewish appears to provoke such strong antipathy in so many people. Although I am atheist and find all religion a bit weird, I don't find Judaism any odder or more threatening than other religions.
At any rational level, anti-semitism is absurd.
Racism may or may not be rational. When two ethnic groups compete for land and resources, racism is rational, if nasty.
But anti-semitism appeals at the emotional, sub-conscious level.
The antisemitism of a Palestinian (and more generally in parts of the Arab world) could be termed rational on this distinction.
Anyone who thinks the antisemitism of the Islamic world is rooted in the Palestinian cause needs their head examining.
Just thinking about the suggested distinction between rational and irrational racism - and the example of a rational type being where 2 ethnic groups are fighting over territory.
If you go with that you might well consider the antisemitism felt by (say) a Palestinian in the Occupied Territories as being rational. But all racism is irrational since it's based on ignorance and prejudice. So this doesn't feel right to me. Rational racism.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
I'd rather have a hydrogen boiler than a bloody air source heat pump.
Never mind the government, the industry is gearing up for hydrogen.
Blue, green, pink. The lot.
Nobody rational is gearing up for hydrogen for domestic purposes.
It is simply not safe. You're kidding yourself if you think it ever will be.
Off topic. A bit of a zigzag journey via Bradford and York, but currently hammering up the ECML towards The Cross. We got seats, but train is wedged out.
It's interesting the Con and the SNP have gone down the tubes at the same time?
Both have been hit by the Labour revival under Starmer.
The SNP are helped too by blaming a Tory government at Westminster for Scotland's problems and the Conservatives as in 2015 can be boosted in England by raising the risk of a weak UK Labour minority government reliant on a strong SNP for confidence and supply
You are overlooking the fact that the Lib Dems could be up for confidence and supply-- no coalitions, of course. So no need for Labour to look to the SNP for support.
I suspect that a moderate Labour government, with its wildest extravagances kept under control by the Lib Dems, could be a very attractive prospect for most of the country - especially after the incompetence and shamelessness of recent Tory governments.
Is there anything that Starmer has done recently to upset Lib Dem voters? Apart from ruling out electoral reform of course - but on that Starmer has gone against Labour Party policy too anyway.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
I'd rather have a hydrogen boiler than a bloody air source heat pump.
Never mind the government, the industry is gearing up for hydrogen.
Blue, green, pink. The lot.
Nobody rational is gearing up for hydrogen for domestic purposes.
It is simply not safe. You're kidding yourself if you think it ever will be.
Next time I speak to someone in Cadent or SGN I'll tell them they aren't rational.
Safety studies indicate that on balance the risk from hydrogen is around the same as natural gas in a domestic setting.
Remember, we used to have a hydrogen/carbon monoxide blend piped into our homes.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
Nah, it's easy. Just line the entire gas network with unobtanium.
What do you mean, boffins? Unobtanium doesn't exist? Go away and invent it. Naughty boffins.
After all, the alternatives all involve doing things that are technically possible, but inconvenient.
I had my annual boiler service recently and asked the guy what was happening with domestic heating just as 'something to ask'. He was 100% on Hydrogen being The Future and reassured me that my boiler would already work with it.
About two weeks later I had to get someone else out as the boiler stopped working and the guy was horrified that the previous one had missed a component which was under a recall from the boiler manufacturer which was A Serious Issue (and thankfully free replacement). I thought I'd ask him the same question about domestic heating. He went on a some length about various governments messing about, then paused and said 'So mate - f*ck knows.'
The boiler working with it isn't the problem. The pipes and joints not leaking a deadly gas is the problem.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
I'd rather have a hydrogen boiler than a bloody air source heat pump.
Never mind the government, the industry is gearing up for hydrogen.
Blue, green, pink. The lot.
Nobody rational is gearing up for hydrogen for domestic purposes.
It is simply not safe. You're kidding yourself if you think it ever will be.
Next time I speak to someone in Cadent or SGN I'll tell them they aren't rational.
Safety studies indicate that on balance the risk from hydrogen is around the same as natural gas in a domestic setting.
Remember, we used to have a hydrogen/carbon monoxide blend piped into our homes.
Anyone rational in Cadent knows its irrational.
If anyone in Cadent is claiming domestic hydrogen is safe they're lying to you, or themselves, or both.
Of course the 2 state solution is dead. There are not two states to do a deal. Israel has occupied and chopped up the West Bank - partly for justified security reasons, partly for religious nut job reasons. And Gaza is a terrorist enclave.
Is not the simple truth that the 2 state solution was never on because the Muslim crazies cannot sanction the Jewish state, and the Jewish crazies are happy to replicate terror with terror of their own.
The crank left repeat the end game: from the river to the sea. A one state solution- the creation for the first time of a Palestinian nation state where Israel now is. So park holier-than-thou we are the oppressed the Jew uniquely is Bad no that isn’t anti-Semitic cos the Jeremy wasn’t how dare you bullshit from the crank left. They don’t want 2 states, they want to remove Israel from existence.
Worse for Israel, remove them from the map is the policy of Iran, Lebanon, Syria, Hamas, Hesbollah, Islamic Jihad etc etc etc. the idea that Israel is the aggressor doesn’t stand up to logic or sanity.
No, and I don’t think this sort of dismissive simplification helps.
We have been much closer to a working 2-state solution in the past. I don’t see the evidence that is was “never on”. Whether it is feasible now after years of continued Israeli settlements in the West Bank is a harder question.
Happy to debate it! My “never on” point was that even back in 2000, the proposed Palestinian state wasn’t acceptable to the Palestinians who preferred war to compromise. The risk to Israel from the Palestinians was the driver of the Israeli demands for compromise, as then demonstrated by the Palestinian switch from peace negotiations to war.
If a viable state couldn’t be founded then, I can’t see how it would be founded now. And again, it is difficult to do so when the elected government is pledged to the destruction of the other state, a position shared by surrounding countries like Iran.
We can’t just give the Israeli governments permission do what they like - some of their acts have been wilfully criminal. But I can understand their position better when most of their neighbours and the counterparty in a 2 state negotiation are pledged to their destruction
What’s telling is that within hours of news of the attacks by Hamas, well before any Israeli retaliation, large numbers of people were out demonstrating - against Israel.
That can only be explained by deep-rooted anti-semitism among those protestors.
"From the River to the Sea". The crank left blame the Jews for violence against Jews. Every pogrom in history is the fault of the victims, the jews bring it on themselves.
Look at the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign statement when Hamas brought medieval slaughter into Israle. No condemnation of beheading babies, no no, its the Jew's fault, and that the just thing to do is to stand in solidarity with the Hamas beheaders. https://palestinecampaign.org/psc-statement-on-escalation-of-violence/
If that isn't anti-semitism, what is?
I wonder if there’s something in the human brain that predisposes us to loathe Jews. Occasionally, I’ve found myself thinking nasty thoughts, before the rational part of my brain kicks in and says, “Why are you thinking that?”
Personally, I find antisemitism quite baffling. While I can understand, though of course not condone racism as fear of those who look different, and xenophobia and religious intolerance as fear of those who behave differently, I can see no reason why Jews should be singled out for hatred any more than any other group. I simply don't understand why just being Jewish appears to provoke such strong antipathy in so many people. Although I am atheist and find all religion a bit weird, I don't find Judaism any odder or more threatening than other religions.
At any rational level, anti-semitism is absurd.
Racism may or may not be rational. When two ethnic groups compete for land and resources, racism is rational, if nasty.
But anti-semitism appeals at the emotional, sub-conscious level.
The antisemitism of a Palestinian (and more generally in parts of the Arab world) could be termed rational on this distinction.
Anyone who thinks the antisemitism of the Islamic world is rooted in the Palestinian cause needs their head examining.
Just thinking about the suggested distinction between rational and irrational racism - and the example of a rational type being where 2 ethnic groups are fighting over territory.
If you go with that you might well consider the antisemitism felt by (say) a Palestinian in the Occupied Territories as being rational. But all racism is irrational since it's based on ignorance and prejudice. So this doesn't feel right to me. Rational racism.
So antisemitism is not the same as racism? Fair enough. Other factors are in play, such as not liking having their homes stolen from under them..... and being treated like dirt....
It's interesting the Con and the SNP have gone down the tubes at the same time?
Both have been hit by the Labour revival under Starmer.
The SNP are helped too by blaming a Tory government at Westminster for Scotland's problems and the Conservatives as in 2015 can be boosted in England by raising the risk of a weak UK Labour minority government reliant on a strong SNP for confidence and supply
You are overlooking the fact that the Lib Dems could be up for confidence and supply-- no coalitions, of course. So no need for Labour to look to the SNP for support.
I suspect that a moderate Labour government, with its wildest extravagances kept under control by the Lib Dems, could be a very attractive prospect for most of the country - especially after the incompetence and shamelessness of recent Tory governments.
Is there anything that Starmer has done recently to upset Lib Dem voters? Apart from ruling out electoral reform of course - but on that Starmer has gone against Labour Party policy too anyway.
In those circs a critical issue is how many LDs there are in England, rather than in Wales or Scotland. At present, about 64% are, though one would expecvt that percentage to rise in the next election on current prospects. A lot of Labour legislation will be England-only.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
The Japanese have been doing interesting development of green CH4 (using an ancient method) for home heating etc purposes.
CO2 + 4x H2 = CH4 + 2x H2O
It's an inefficient method, but it's infinitely safer than pumping hydrogen into homes.
And if it's done using surplus energy that would go to waste otherwise, eg on very windy days when there's limited demand, then it might be viable.
Carbon dioxide plus 4 hydrogens gives methane plus two waters? Sounds good, but where do you get the hydrogen from? There are no hydrogen mines on Earth and the nearest source of uncombined hydrogen is Jupiter.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
The Japanese have been doing interesting development of green CH4 (using an ancient method) for home heating etc purposes.
CO2 + 4x H2 = CH4 + 2x H2O
It's an inefficient method, but it's infinitely safer than pumping hydrogen into homes.
And if it's done using surplus energy that would go to waste otherwise, eg on very windy days when there's limited demand, then it might be viable.
Carbon dioxide plus 4 hydrogens gives methane plus two waters? Sounds good, but where do you get the hydrogen from? There are no hydrogen mines on Earth and the nearest source of uncombined hydrogen is Jupiter.
Electrolysis of water using electricity that would go to waste otherwise.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
I'd rather have a hydrogen boiler than a bloody air source heat pump.
Never mind the government, the industry is gearing up for hydrogen.
Blue, green, pink. The lot.
Nobody rational is gearing up for hydrogen for domestic purposes.
It is simply not safe. You're kidding yourself if you think it ever will be.
Next time I speak to someone in Cadent or SGN I'll tell them they aren't rational.
Safety studies indicate that on balance the risk from hydrogen is around the same as natural gas in a domestic setting.
Remember, we used to have a hydrogen/carbon monoxide blend piped into our homes.
Anyone rational in Cadent knows its irrational.
If anyone in Cadent is claiming domestic hydrogen is safe they're lying to you, or themselves, or both.
Admitting so would be bad for business though.
Good news. All these new houses that you and Starmer want to build across the countryside won't have mains gas and will have to rely on heat pumps.
There will be riots on the streets if any future government forces the gas distribution network to be shut down and everyone being forced to install a heat pump and new central heating system.
TLDR: housebuilding is controlled by a monopoly of developers who don’t give a fuck.
In the early 70s we lived in a terraced house in a village called Bomlitz. It was being rented by the British army, so it wasn't anything fancy. It had 2 bedrooms and a box room, too small to be a bedroom so my brother and I shared.
Except...being German it also had a concrete basement which contained the boiler and several other rooms that made an excellent indoor play area, a dry store etc. It also had a concrete floor in the attic with a hook down stair which gave my mum room to dry her clothes indoors if it was raining by opening the windows on either side. So what would have been a small, cramped terrace in the UK actually felt pretty palatial. The concrete floor in the roof helped to keep the whole house warm, even in German winters. Even as a 10 year old I remember thinking why don't we build houses like this? 52 years on I am still wondering.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
Did look nice though - no flame, nothing. Looked like it was levitating. Eg Black Arrow at Woomera:
There will not be one fit-all situation. Use cases are just too different to allow it, especially using current tech.
Hydrogen for home power seems stupid to me (and I've said so on here passim). JCB might have an unusual use case with their system, but that will always be niche. But niche can work for niche cases.
And we still have the problem with energy storage. Yes, battery prices are falling and capacities increasing. But if we want a green future, we need to acknowledge that there will be periods when we have too much energy produced, and too little at others. This means we need a way of storing energy. And hydrogen, although inefficient, may be better at balancing generation and demand than letting the excess go to waste.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
I'd rather have a hydrogen boiler than a bloody air source heat pump.
Never mind the government, the industry is gearing up for hydrogen.
Blue, green, pink. The lot.
Nobody rational is gearing up for hydrogen for domestic purposes.
It is simply not safe. You're kidding yourself if you think it ever will be.
Next time I speak to someone in Cadent or SGN I'll tell them they aren't rational.
Safety studies indicate that on balance the risk from hydrogen is around the same as natural gas in a domestic setting.
Remember, we used to have a hydrogen/carbon monoxide blend piped into our homes.
"Studies say" are the 2020's equivalent of "a bloke down the pub says". Every time we pump some kind of gas into our homes it goes wrong. There are bangs and leaks and deaths and all sorts. Hydrogen is an expensive way of producing bigger bangs, more leaks and more deaths. I'm quietly amazed by how many people just think it's a good idea.
There will not be one fit-all situation. Use cases are just too different to allow it, especially using current tech.
Hydrogen for home power seems stupid to me (and I've said so on here passim). JCB might have an unusual use case with their system, but that will always be niche. But niche can work for niche cases.
And we still have the problem with energy storage. Yes, battery prices are falling and capacities increasing. But if we want a green future, we need to acknowledge that there will be periods when we have too much energy produced, and too little at others. This means we need a way of storing energy. And hydrogen, although inefficient, may be better at balancing generation and demand than letting the excess go to waste.
One could certainly imagine tidal stations out in the middle of nowhere with hydrogen storage and a greenhouse farm to use the waste heat. I wonder how small they could scale?
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
The Japanese have been doing interesting development of green CH4 (using an ancient method) for home heating etc purposes.
CO2 + 4x H2 = CH4 + 2x H2O
It's an inefficient method, but it's infinitely safer than pumping hydrogen into homes.
And if it's done using surplus energy that would go to waste otherwise, eg on very windy days when there's limited demand, then it might be viable.
Carbon dioxide plus 4 hydrogens gives methane plus two waters? Sounds good, but where do you get the hydrogen from? There are no hydrogen mines on Earth and the nearest source of uncombined hydrogen is Jupiter.
Electrolysis of water using electricity that would go to waste otherwise.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
Did look nice though - no flame, nothing. Looked like it was levitating. Eg Black Arrow at Woomera:
It did. And when they were doing test-stand tests on the South Coast of England (Southampton? I forget) they used to have troughs scattered around the site filled with water so that when concentrated H202 spills spontaneously combusted and set your clothes/you on fire, you could dive into the troughs and stand a very good chance of nearly not dying.
Of course the 2 state solution is dead. There are not two states to do a deal. Israel has occupied and chopped up the West Bank - partly for justified security reasons, partly for religious nut job reasons. And Gaza is a terrorist enclave.
Is not the simple truth that the 2 state solution was never on because the Muslim crazies cannot sanction the Jewish state, and the Jewish crazies are happy to replicate terror with terror of their own.
The crank left repeat the end game: from the river to the sea. A one state solution- the creation for the first time of a Palestinian nation state where Israel now is. So park holier-than-thou we are the oppressed the Jew uniquely is Bad no that isn’t anti-Semitic cos the Jeremy wasn’t how dare you bullshit from the crank left. They don’t want 2 states, they want to remove Israel from existence.
Worse for Israel, remove them from the map is the policy of Iran, Lebanon, Syria, Hamas, Hesbollah, Islamic Jihad etc etc etc. the idea that Israel is the aggressor doesn’t stand up to logic or sanity.
No, and I don’t think this sort of dismissive simplification helps.
We have been much closer to a working 2-state solution in the past. I don’t see the evidence that is was “never on”. Whether it is feasible now after years of continued Israeli settlements in the West Bank is a harder question.
Happy to debate it! My “never on” point was that even back in 2000, the proposed Palestinian state wasn’t acceptable to the Palestinians who preferred war to compromise. The risk to Israel from the Palestinians was the driver of the Israeli demands for compromise, as then demonstrated by the Palestinian switch from peace negotiations to war.
If a viable state couldn’t be founded then, I can’t see how it would be founded now. And again, it is difficult to do so when the elected government is pledged to the destruction of the other state, a position shared by surrounding countries like Iran.
We can’t just give the Israeli governments permission do what they like - some of their acts have been wilfully criminal. But I can understand their position better when most of their neighbours and the counterparty in a 2 state negotiation are pledged to their destruction
What’s telling is that within hours of news of the attacks by Hamas, well before any Israeli retaliation, large numbers of people were out demonstrating - against Israel.
That can only be explained by deep-rooted anti-semitism among those protestors.
"From the River to the Sea". The crank left blame the Jews for violence against Jews. Every pogrom in history is the fault of the victims, the jews bring it on themselves.
Look at the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign statement when Hamas brought medieval slaughter into Israle. No condemnation of beheading babies, no no, its the Jew's fault, and that the just thing to do is to stand in solidarity with the Hamas beheaders. https://palestinecampaign.org/psc-statement-on-escalation-of-violence/
If that isn't anti-semitism, what is?
I wonder if there’s something in the human brain that predisposes us to loathe Jews. Occasionally, I’ve found myself thinking nasty thoughts, before the rational part of my brain kicks in and says, “Why are you thinking that?”
Personally, I find antisemitism quite baffling. While I can understand, though of course not condone racism as fear of those who look different, and xenophobia and religious intolerance as fear of those who behave differently, I can see no reason why Jews should be singled out for hatred any more than any other group. I simply don't understand why just being Jewish appears to provoke such strong antipathy in so many people. Although I am atheist and find all religion a bit weird, I don't find Judaism any odder or more threatening than other religions.
At any rational level, anti-semitism is absurd.
Racism may or may not be rational. When two ethnic groups compete for land and resources, racism is rational, if nasty.
But anti-semitism appeals at the emotional, sub-conscious level.
The antisemitism of a Palestinian (and more generally in parts of the Arab world) could be termed rational on this distinction.
Anyone who thinks the antisemitism of the Islamic world is rooted in the Palestinian cause needs their head examining.
Just thinking about the suggested distinction between rational and irrational racism - and the example of a rational type being where 2 ethnic groups are fighting over territory.
If you go with that you might well consider the antisemitism felt by (say) a Palestinian in the Occupied Territories as being rational. But all racism is irrational since it's based on ignorance and prejudice. So this doesn't feel right to me. Rational racism.
So antisemitism is not the same as racism? Fair enough. Other factors are in play, such as not liking having their homes stolen from under them..... and being treated like dirt....
I wasn't suggesting antisemitism isn't racism. I think it is.
“If somebody is so out of step with where the Republican electorate is, where the MAGA movement is, how can they even be in the conversation?” Epshteyn said. “We need a MAGA speaker. That’s what it comes down to. Because if you look at the numbers, if you look at the energy, if you look at the heat, this is the Trump party, this is the MAGA party. It is no longer the old-school khaki establishment Republican Party.”..
A demagogue hiding in plain sight.
The US will rue the day they re-elect Trump next November.
Trump may be in jail next November if convicted in his criminal cases next year
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
I'd rather have a hydrogen boiler than a bloody air source heat pump.
Never mind the government, the industry is gearing up for hydrogen.
Blue, green, pink. The lot.
Nobody rational is gearing up for hydrogen for domestic purposes.
It is simply not safe. You're kidding yourself if you think it ever will be.
Next time I speak to someone in Cadent or SGN I'll tell them they aren't rational.
Safety studies indicate that on balance the risk from hydrogen is around the same as natural gas in a domestic setting.
Remember, we used to have a hydrogen/carbon monoxide blend piped into our homes.
Anyone rational in Cadent knows its irrational.
If anyone in Cadent is claiming domestic hydrogen is safe they're lying to you, or themselves, or both.
Admitting so would be bad for business though.
Good news. All these new houses that you and Starmer want to build across the countryside won't have mains gas and will have to rely on heat pumps.
There will be riots on the streets if any future government forces the gas distribution network to be shut down and everyone being forced to install a heat pump and new central heating system.
There will be even more riots if anyone tries to force the gas network to distribute hydrogen instead of methane.
Either a green source of methane is needed, or an alternative to gas. Hydrogen is not an option.
Hydrogen to methane is viable. Inefficient, but inefficient and safe beats fatal and impossible.
Indications are emerging that they plan to cut IHT and/or Stamp Duty next Spring. That would be electioneering in its purest form.
IHT should not be cut. Tax on unearned wealth needs to be increased not decreased.
If the Tories abolish IHT then Labour should just make Income Tax apply in full to all Inheritances. No special IHT rate or allowances.
Unearned and earned income should be taxed at the same rate. And if not the same rate, then unearned should be taxed higher.
Instead presently earned salaries are the highest taxed thing around, it is economically backwards, completely insane, bad for productivity and simply unfair too.
Cancelling IHT is a good one for Tories since it will force Labour to say what they would do and putting it straight back on would probably not be a good idea for them.
I presume chess-playing Reeves has wargamed out what to do if Sunak does abolish IHT.
Where are the Tories going to find 7 billion a year to fund the IHT scrapping ?
The problem for the Tories is that whilst public services are crumbling tax cuts or scrapping the IHT just look like desperate attempts to grab votes whilst ignoring those issues.
Put scrapping IHT or raising the threshold for all estates to £1 million and if the Tories win they can say they have a mandate for it and more likely if they still lose anyway they would likely have saved a few bluewall seats as a result and as they are no longer in government don't have to implement it anyway
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
Basically: - Our core vote is used to the way things have "always been," (at least for them). - That means heating with gas brought into the house in pipes - We need to stop using natural gas. - If we just switch to using another gas, they won't be grumpy - The experts are saying that won't be possible - That's unacceptable - We will therefore do it anyway
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
The Japanese have been doing interesting development of green CH4 (using an ancient method) for home heating etc purposes.
CO2 + 4x H2 = CH4 + 2x H2O
It's an inefficient method, but it's infinitely safer than pumping hydrogen into homes.
And if it's done using surplus energy that would go to waste otherwise, eg on very windy days when there's limited demand, then it might be viable.
Carbon dioxide plus 4 hydrogens gives methane plus two waters? Sounds good, but where do you get the hydrogen from? There are no hydrogen mines on Earth and the nearest source of uncombined hydrogen is Jupiter.
Electrolysis of water using electricity that would go to waste otherwise.
So we convert water and electricity to hydrogen and oxygen, then convert the hydrogen (with carbon dioxide) to methane and water, then pump the methane via pipes into homes so they can convert it into heat
We could do that. Or we could just - bear with me here - lay wires into homes and pump the electricity into homes directly so they can convert it into heat.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
Did look nice though - no flame, nothing. Looked like it was levitating. Eg Black Arrow at Woomera:
It did. And when they were doing test-stand tests on the South Coast of England (Southampton? I forget) they used to have troughs scattered around the site filled with water so that when concentrated H202 spills spontaneously combusted and set your clothes/you on fire, you could dive into the troughs and stand a very good chance of nearly not dying.
The test stands were on the Isle of Wight, overlooking the Needles. Quite a fascinating place to explore, with the old-modern on top of an ex-Napoleonic fort.
It's interesting the Con and the SNP have gone down the tubes at the same time?
Both have been hit by the Labour revival under Starmer.
The SNP are helped too by blaming a Tory government at Westminster for Scotland's problems and the Conservatives as in 2015 can be boosted in England by raising the risk of a weak UK Labour minority government reliant on a strong SNP for confidence and supply
You are overlooking the fact that the Lib Dems could be up for confidence and supply-- no coalitions, of course. So no need for Labour to look to the SNP for support.
I suspect that a moderate Labour government, with its wildest extravagances kept under control by the Lib Dems, could be a very attractive prospect for most of the country - especially after the incompetence and shamelessness of recent Tory governments.
Is there anything that Starmer has done recently to upset Lib Dem voters? Apart from ruling out electoral reform of course - but on that Starmer has gone against Labour Party policy too anyway.
No I wasn't, I was saying Labour are now heading for a clear majority anyway (even without the LDs) and so the SNP will not be able to blame a Tory UK government for problems and the Tories won't be able to warn of a Labour minority government propped up by the SNP.
Building on the greenbelt is one area a Starmer government could clash with southern LD MPs
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
This one is almost certainly about institutional policy.
Hydrogen was supposed to the future. Hydrogen powered cars, planes, everything.
The official world liked it because, unlike electricity, it is easier to control and tax as a product. The big oil companies planned to switch to making hydrogen.
The press was squared, the middle class quite prepared. This was the Proper Policy before 1997
You see similar things with respect to wind (in) solar (in) nuclear (in) tidal (out)
The problem is the Proper Policy doesn’t work. Making hydrogen from electricity to store power is wildly inefficient. Storing and using hydrogen is very problematic.
Storing and using hydrogen in properly set up industrial purposes can work. With intensive safety procedures.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
I'd rather have a hydrogen boiler than a bloody air source heat pump.
Never mind the government, the industry is gearing up for hydrogen.
Blue, green, pink. The lot.
Nobody rational is gearing up for hydrogen for domestic purposes.
It is simply not safe. You're kidding yourself if you think it ever will be.
Next time I speak to someone in Cadent or SGN I'll tell them they aren't rational.
Safety studies indicate that on balance the risk from hydrogen is around the same as natural gas in a domestic setting.
Remember, we used to have a hydrogen/carbon monoxide blend piped into our homes.
Anyone rational in Cadent knows its irrational.
If anyone in Cadent is claiming domestic hydrogen is safe they're lying to you, or themselves, or both.
Admitting so would be bad for business though.
Good news. All these new houses that you and Starmer want to build across the countryside won't have mains gas and will have to rely on heat pumps.
There will be riots on the streets if any future government forces the gas distribution network to be shut down and everyone being forced to install a heat pump and new central heating system.
There will be even more riots if anyone tries to force the gas network to distribute hydrogen instead of methane.
Either a green source of methane is needed, or an alternative to gas. Hydrogen is not an option.
Hydrogen to methane is viable. Inefficient, but inefficient and safe beats fatal and impossible.
My last post on this topic...
For the SNG to be 'green' you need green CO2. That means either from Direct Air Capture (thermodynamically bonkers, uses a shit load of energy and costs a fortune), or from a vast quantity of 'sustainable' biomass (see the Panorama on Drax). If you are going to use biomass, better to gasify it and then use the syngas as the feed for methanation to produce the SNG. No need for electrolytic hydrogen.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
The Japanese have been doing interesting development of green CH4 (using an ancient method) for home heating etc purposes.
CO2 + 4x H2 = CH4 + 2x H2O
It's an inefficient method, but it's infinitely safer than pumping hydrogen into homes.
And if it's done using surplus energy that would go to waste otherwise, eg on very windy days when there's limited demand, then it might be viable.
Carbon dioxide plus 4 hydrogens gives methane plus two waters? Sounds good, but where do you get the hydrogen from? There are no hydrogen mines on Earth and the nearest source of uncombined hydrogen is Jupiter.
Electrolysis of water using electricity that would go to waste otherwise.
So we convert water and electricity to hydrogen and oxygen, then convert the hydrogen (with carbon dioxide) to methane and water, then pump the methane via pipes into homes so they can convert it into heat
We could do that. Or we could just - bear with me here - lay wires into homes and pump the electricity into homes directly so they can convert it into heat.
I like plan B
Both plans are viable.
Converting water and redundant electricity to hydrogen allows storage too of power. Since hydrogen is safe for industrial, rather than domestic, purposes so long as handled properly you can do water + electricity to hydrogen, then hydrogen to electricity when electricity is required later on.
Yes its inefficient, but it works. And if the electricity is only going to be wasted if its not used, then its better to use it even in a less efficient method.
Stored hydrogen, or methane, created via electrolysis when there is surplus wind can also be used while there's a low pressure system that makes electricity generation tougher.
It's interesting the Con and the SNP have gone down the tubes at the same time?
Both have been hit by the Labour revival under Starmer.
The SNP are helped too by blaming a Tory government at Westminster for Scotland's problems and the Conservatives as in 2015 can be boosted in England by raising the risk of a weak UK Labour minority government reliant on a strong SNP for confidence and supply
You are overlooking the fact that the Lib Dems could be up for confidence and supply-- no coalitions, of course. So no need for Labour to look to the SNP for support.
I suspect that a moderate Labour government, with its wildest extravagances kept under control by the Lib Dems, could be a very attractive prospect for most of the country - especially after the incompetence and shamelessness of recent Tory governments.
Is there anything that Starmer has done recently to upset Lib Dem voters? Apart from ruling out electoral reform of course - but on that Starmer has gone against Labour Party policy too anyway.
No I wasn't, I was saying Labour are now heading for a clear majority anyway (even without the LDs) and so the SNP will not be able to blame a Tory UK government for problems and the Tories won't be able to warn of a Labour minority government propped up by the SNP.
Building on the greenbelt is one area a Starmer government could clash with southern LD MPs
He'll be clashing with a chunk of the Labour Party too. Me, for a start.
I don't know what to think about hydrogen as a gas for heating. My new Viessmann boiler of last year is described as "hydrogen ready". But I can believe there are problems in the pipe infrastructure. As a u/g student of chemistry in the early 60s I had a traineeship with Farbwerke Hoechst in Frankfurt am Main where they gave me a job testing for impurities which involved burning substances in a controlled mixture of hydrogen and oxygen. At this distance in time I'm astonished they gave a callow student temp such a dangerous assignment. AIUI hydrogen would be mixed in some proportion with natural gas for use in boilers, and I don't think there's a particular problem with its combustability in a well designed boiler. I think the main issues are to do with leakage from the pipes.
That’s fine for the well off, what about the 20% rate for the people who really need the help ?
The lowest earners were taken out of income tax altogether about 10 years ago, the Tories now need to do something for their base
You really are ignorant.
Personal allowance is £242 per week.
Minimum Wage = £10.42
10.42 x 37.5 = £390.75
Is £390.75 more or less than £242 in your view.
Sunak's fiscal drag has reversed much of the good work Cameron and Osborne did in lifting personal allowances.
So percentage wise they are still now paying significantly less than the highest earners in income tax (and of course some on minimum wage are only part time and will still pay no income tax at all)
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
Did look nice though - no flame, nothing. Looked like it was levitating. Eg Black Arrow at Woomera:
It did. And when they were doing test-stand tests on the South Coast of England (Southampton? I forget) they used to have troughs scattered around the site filled with water so that when concentrated H202 spills spontaneously combusted and set your clothes/you on fire, you could dive into the troughs and stand a very good chance of nearly not dying.
The test stands were on the Isle of Wight, overlooking the Needles. Quite a fascinating place to explore, with the old-modern on top of an ex-Napoleonic fort.
IIRC it was part of a WW2 gun emplacement above the test stands, rather than the C19 battery. But memory is a bit faint. I see they have done it up and opened it to the public since we were there.
That’s fine for the well off, what about the 20% rate for the people who really need the help ?
The lowest earners were taken out of income tax altogether about 10 years ago, the Tories now need to do something for their base
A FT worker on minimum wage (then lowest earners) receives about £21K, rising to about £22K next year. They pay IT/NI at the rate of 32% (20% IT, 12% NI) on £9/10K of that. Nearly £3000 per annum.
The double scandal is that they pay much tax at all and that the higher rate of 42% (40% IT and 2% NI) isn't all that much more.
Batting like this it wouldn't have made any difference if batted first or second.
Unless batting like this is a consequence of them being dehydrated and exhausted. In the conditions fielding first was a bizarre decision.
There has to be something seriously wrong with the side. I suspect a mixtue of arrogance and 'couldn't care less' amongst players who make a lot of money from the game outside of this particular competition. When something goes badly wrong in a squad with so many obviously talented players, there has to be a fundamental reason for it that goes beyond mere loss of form, bad luck or individual errors.
That’s fine for the well off, what about the 20% rate for the people who really need the help ?
The lowest earners were taken out of income tax altogether about 10 years ago, the Tories now need to do something for their base
A FT worker on minimum wage (then lowest earners) receives about £21K, rising to about £22K next year. They pay IT/NI at the rate of 32% (20% IT, 12% NI) on £9/10K of that. Nearly £3000 per annum.
The double scandal is that they pay much tax at all and that the higher rate of 42% (40% IT and 2% NI) isn't all that much more.
The treble scandal is that due to the UC Taper they realistically are on a much higher rate of real marginal tax.
'The National Infrastructure Commission advised this week, after an exhaustive investigation of the technology, that hydrogen was not suitable for heating homes. The report was unambiguous: “The Commission’s analysis demonstrates that there is no public policy case for hydrogen to be used to heat individual buildings. It should be ruled out as an option to enable an exclusive focus on switching to electrified heat.”
However, the government indicated to the Guardian that it would continue to push hydrogen for home heating, and the body that represents most of the heating industry also vowed to continue to pursue it.'
Given how long it took us to find a reliable worker to mend a persistent gas leak in our house discovered after we bought it, no thanks, no hydrogen for me!
Handing hydrogen has well defined safety practises and methods. I can’t see how you could put hydrogen through home gas pipes and meet through standards.
To start with Hydrogen embrittles materials by permeating *through* apparently solid material. It can also leak through joints that are 100% gas and water tight.
Hydrogen is completely safe as long as you remember how dangerous it is.
Quite. There was that discussion of science denial in politics a few weeks back on PB. This hydrogen stuff is the sort of thing that makes the Tory Party look like those American legislators who defined pi as 3.000 exactly.
Either that, or they know it's a disaster but think they will be able to dump the blame on Labour - who will have to cancel this.
No,I think they genuinely think it's a really good idea. They "did their research". They googled it. They found somebody online who says it's safe. Look! It's on the phone! It must be true! Hydrogen is perfectly safe!
I don't think we have come to terms with the fact that our political classes may, in an entirely serious and unsarcastic way, have become untethered from reality. By abandoning the concept of "expert" and devolving to our own flawed judgement based on an infinitude of internet bullshit means that intelligent and reasonable people think that we can pump hydrogen into homes and nothing will go wrong.
It takes only a few minutes of studying the storage of hydrogen, and GCSE-level chemistry, to know that it’s a horrible material to store and move, and requires very special, expensive and with short lifespan, containers and pipes to stop the stuff escaping!
Instead, it’s “yay, less carbon than normal house gas, must be brilliant”.
The is a whole Hydrogen Industry devoted to pushing Hydrogen in officialdom. Bit like Big Nuclear.
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
There’s numerous industry’s sprouted up lobbying on behalf of their chosen product or cause. Heat pumps will be no different.
When I worked at Baxi I worked with people who were lobbying the govt at the time. Combi boilers IIRC. Businesses, NGO’s and charities lobby all the time.
I guess lobbying is only suspect if people disagree with what is being lobbied for.
Batting like this it wouldn't have made any difference if batted first or second.
Unless batting like this is a consequence of them being dehydrated and exhausted. In the conditions fielding first was a bizarre decision.
There has to be something seriously wrong with the side. I suspect a mixtue of arrogance and 'couldn't care less' amongst players who make a lot of money from the game outside of this particular competition. When something goes badly wrong in a squad with so many obviously talented players, there has to be a fundamental reason for it that goes beyond mere loss of form, bad luck or individual errors.
Well the top players play very little ODI cricket now. No domestic version because it clashes with the Hundred and in recent past the ODI team when they do play is often a B team. And of course the ECB want to totally kill this version of the game.
I see they are talking about making the hundred a much bigger 2 division tournament.
Batting like this it wouldn't have made any difference if batted first or second.
Unless batting like this is a consequence of them being dehydrated and exhausted. In the conditions fielding first was a bizarre decision.
There has to be something seriously wrong with the side. I suspect a mixtue of arrogance and 'couldn't care less' amongst players who make a lot of money from the game outside of this particular competition. When something goes badly wrong in a squad with so many obviously talented players, there has to be a fundamental reason for it that goes beyond mere loss of form, bad luck or individual errors.
The bowling seriously lacks penetration, especially after the first 3 or 4 overs when the ball stops swinging. Too many teams are getting very long partnerships which are not being broken. There are also too many half fit players. Should Stokes really being played if he can't bowl? I think he has just answered that. Rashid is superb but not fully fit either. They are just not up for this, not at all.
Batting like this it wouldn't have made any difference if batted first or second.
Unless batting like this is a consequence of them being dehydrated and exhausted. In the conditions fielding first was a bizarre decision.
There has to be something seriously wrong with the side. I suspect a mixtue of arrogance and 'couldn't care less' amongst players who make a lot of money from the game outside of this particular competition. When something goes badly wrong in a squad with so many obviously talented players, there has to be a fundamental reason for it that goes beyond mere loss of form, bad luck or individual errors.
The bowling seriously lacks penetration, especially after the first 3 or 4 overs when the ball stops swinging. Too many teams are getting very long partnerships which are not being broken. There are also too many half fit players. Should Stokes really being played if he can't bowl? I think he has just answered that. Rashid is superb but not fully fit either. They are just not up for this, not at all.
This is where Liam Plunkett was massively under rated in the successful team. He was brilliant at breaking thise partnerships in the middle overs.
That’s fine for the well off, what about the 20% rate for the people who really need the help ?
The lowest earners were taken out of income tax altogether about 10 years ago, the Tories now need to do something for their base
A FT worker on minimum wage (then lowest earners) receives about £21K, rising to about £22K next year. They pay IT/NI at the rate of 32% (20% IT, 12% NI) on £9/10K of that. Nearly £3000 per annum.
The double scandal is that they pay much tax at all and that the higher rate of 42% (40% IT and 2% NI) isn't all that much more.
So the higher rate is still more then, even in percentage terms
Comments
Lots of glossy reports by experts. Lots of solemn reports by Senior Officials. It’s in every Red Box they send home with the ministers.
Read up on the story of how the U.K. went down the H2O2 rabbit hole in rocketry after the war, continuing long, long after everyone else used LOX. Which apart from being cheaper, simpler and safer only offered better performance.
Doing it in domestic situations is just Never Going To Happen.
Anyone proposing it for domestic hearing is either disingenuous or stupid. Or both.
2 little, 2 late.
Can’t be arsed to go to the pub now as planned, will go just before the rugby instead and save my money.
What do you mean, boffins? Unobtanium doesn't exist? Go away and invent it. Naughty boffins.
After all, the alternatives all involve doing things that are technically possible, but inconvenient.
Never mind the government, the industry is gearing up for hydrogen.
Blue, green, pink. The lot.
The SNP are helped too by blaming a Tory government at Westminster for Scotland's problems and the Conservatives as in 2015 can be boosted in England by raising the risk of a weak UK Labour minority government reliant on a strong SNP for confidence and supply
CO2 + 4x H2 = CH4 + 2x H2O
It's an inefficient method, but it's infinitely safer than pumping hydrogen into homes.
And if it's done using surplus energy that would go to waste otherwise, eg on very windy days when there's limited demand, then it might be viable.
About two weeks later I had to get someone else out as the boiler stopped working and the guy was horrified that the previous one had missed a component which was under a recall from the boiler manufacturer which was A Serious Issue (and thankfully free replacement). I thought I'd ask him the same question about domestic heating. He went on a some length about various governments messing about, then paused and said 'So mate - f*ck knows.'
The rightwing Thatcher however beat the centrist Callaghan in 1979 as the economy was weak.
What the economy looks like under a Starmer government would be far more significant than who the next Tory leader is.
Remember too even Howard won most votes in England in 2005, helped by Labour defections to the LDs over the Iraq War
If you go with that you might well consider the antisemitism felt by (say) a Palestinian in the Occupied Territories as being rational. But all racism is irrational since it's based on ignorance and prejudice. So this doesn't feel right to me. Rational racism.
It is simply not safe. You're kidding yourself if you think it ever will be.
I suspect that a moderate Labour government, with its wildest extravagances kept under control by the Lib Dems, could be a very attractive prospect for most of the country - especially after the incompetence and shamelessness of recent Tory governments.
Is there anything that Starmer has done recently to upset Lib Dem voters? Apart from ruling out electoral reform of course - but on that Starmer has gone against Labour Party policy too anyway.
Safety studies indicate that on balance the risk from hydrogen is around the same as natural gas in a domestic setting.
Remember, we used to have a hydrogen/carbon monoxide blend piped into our homes.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live/cricket/66858385
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live/cricket/66858381
It's never going to happen. It can't.
https://x.com/ollywainwright/status/1715655218510155799?s=46&t=L9g_woCIqbo1MTuBFCK0xg
TLDR: housebuilding is controlled by a monopoly of developers who don’t give a fuck.
If anyone in Cadent is claiming domestic hydrogen is safe they're lying to you, or themselves, or both.
Admitting so would be bad for business though.
There will be riots on the streets if any future government forces the gas distribution network to be shut down and everyone being forced to install a heat pump and new central heating system.
Except...being German it also had a concrete basement which contained the boiler and several other rooms that made an excellent indoor play area, a dry store etc. It also had a concrete floor in the attic with a hook down stair which gave my mum room to dry her clothes indoors if it was raining by opening the windows on either side. So what would have been a small, cramped terrace in the UK actually felt pretty palatial. The concrete floor in the roof helped to keep the whole house warm, even in German winters. Even as a 10 year old I remember thinking why don't we build houses like this? 52 years on I am still wondering.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O489SqLyw5Y
There will not be one fit-all situation. Use cases are just too different to allow it, especially using current tech.
Hydrogen for home power seems stupid to me (and I've said so on here passim). JCB might have an unusual use case with their system, but that will always be niche. But niche can work for niche cases.
And we still have the problem with energy storage. Yes, battery prices are falling and capacities increasing. But if we want a green future, we need to acknowledge that there will be periods when we have too much energy produced, and too little at others. This means we need a way of storing energy. And hydrogen, although inefficient, may be better at balancing generation and demand than letting the excess go to waste.
It is called methanation, BTW.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-test_peroxide
See also https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0FLy2nI13E
Either a green source of methane is needed, or an alternative to gas. Hydrogen is not an option.
Hydrogen to methane is viable. Inefficient, but inefficient and safe beats fatal and impossible.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/10/20/rishi-sunak-tax-cut-40pc-threshold-tories-high-earners-uk/
- Our core vote is used to the way things have "always been," (at least for them).
- That means heating with gas brought into the house in pipes
- We need to stop using natural gas.
- If we just switch to using another gas, they won't be grumpy
- The experts are saying that won't be possible
- That's unacceptable
- We will therefore do it anyway
We could do that. Or we could just - bear with me here - lay wires into homes and pump the electricity into homes directly so they can convert it into heat.
I like plan B
Building on the greenbelt is one area a Starmer government could clash with southern LD MPs
For the SNG to be 'green' you need green CO2. That means either from Direct Air Capture (thermodynamically bonkers, uses a shit load of energy and costs a fortune), or from a vast quantity of 'sustainable' biomass (see the Panorama on Drax). If you are going to use biomass, better to gasify it and then use the syngas as the feed for methanation to produce the SNG. No need for electrolytic hydrogen.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/10/20/israel-hand-gaza-control-palestinian-authority-post-hamas/
Converting water and redundant electricity to hydrogen allows storage too of power. Since hydrogen is safe for industrial, rather than domestic, purposes so long as handled properly you can do water + electricity to hydrogen, then hydrogen to electricity when electricity is required later on.
Yes its inefficient, but it works. And if the electricity is only going to be wasted if its not used, then its better to use it even in a less efficient method.
Stored hydrogen, or methane, created via electrolysis when there is surplus wind can also be used while there's a low pressure system that makes electricity generation tougher.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/10/20/terrorist-attack-in-uk-linked-to-gaza/
Personal allowance is £242 per week.
Minimum Wage = £10.42
10.42 x 37.5 = £390.75
Is £390.75 more or less than £242 in your view.
Sunak's fiscal drag has reversed much of the good work Cameron and Osborne did in lifting personal allowances.
As a u/g student of chemistry in the early 60s I had a traineeship with Farbwerke Hoechst in Frankfurt am Main where they gave me a job testing for impurities which involved burning substances in a controlled mixture of hydrogen and oxygen. At this distance in time I'm astonished they gave a callow student temp such a dangerous assignment.
AIUI hydrogen would be mixed in some proportion with natural gas for use in boilers, and I don't think there's a particular problem with its combustability in a well designed boiler. I think the main issues are to do with leakage from the pipes.
Season over, go home.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJ-2cqz5KUI
He just doesn't say the Tories put the lowest earners back into income tax.
The double scandal is that they pay much tax at all and that the higher rate of 42% (40% IT and 2% NI) isn't all that much more.
There’s numerous industry’s sprouted up lobbying on behalf of their chosen product or cause. Heat pumps will be no different.
When I worked at Baxi I worked with people who were lobbying the govt at the time. Combi boilers IIRC. Businesses, NGO’s and charities lobby all the time.
I guess lobbying is only suspect if people disagree with what is being lobbied for.
I see they are talking about making the hundred a much bigger 2 division tournament.
This is over. Total humiliation.
So at this rate we can get the required target with the loss of only 32 wickets.
https://x.com/GBNEWS/status/1715710649840378280?s=20