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I'm not surprised at all --- it's because climate change is so political and everything is so polarizing. Talk to a right leaning person and they will tell you
by misiti3780 6y ago
I'm not surprised at all --- it's because climate change is so political and everything is so polarizing.
Talk to a right leaning person and they will tell you that the rolling blackouts in California are due to the fact that the electrical grid is too dependent on renewables, and the forest fires are due to too much environmental regulation. They will probably indicate that the Texas storm was a 1 in a 100 year storm, so there was no way to plan for it, it was a black swan.
Now go talk to a left leaning person and they will tell you the Texas electric grid is too dependent on nuclear energy and de-regulation of electricity is the root cause. The storm might have affected the poorer neighborhoods, so it was yet another example of systemic racism. They will say the Texans need to stop electing people that dont believe in climate change.
Of course there is probably some truth to both, and both sides can actually have valid points, but 99% of the US doesn't seem to understand or speak with any nuance anymore - and it's a huge problem. They re-tweet, re--gram, and re-post content in fits of confirmation bias, only skimming headlines on clickbait.
- onlyrealcuzzo 6y agoThat's sad. Texas is pretty green in terms of power generation - even compared to California. Texas is 20% renewables [1], California is 32% [2]. [1] https://www.energy.ca.gov/data-reports/energy-almanac/california-electricity-data/2019-total-system-electric-generation https://www.energy.ca.gov/data-reports/energy-almanac/califo... [2] https://www.eia.gov/state/analysis.php?sid=TX https://www.eia.gov/state/analysis.php?sid=TX
- misiti3780 6y agoI'm not taking a side here, I'm telling you what is happening because I have friends and family on both sides of the isle.
- hsitz 6y agoNote that the source you're using for California lists 'large hydro' as around 15%, but doesn't count it as a "renewable". Texas, by contrast, has close to zero 'large hydro'. It's not clear to me that 'large hydro' is a non-renewable', certainly it's a lot different from most non-renewables, and it's not carbon dioxide producing. If you take that into account, then from (coal/natural gas/oil/nuclear) California has more like 53% of energy while Texas has 80%. That gives a little different perspective. Compare, e.g., with this list, which includes hydro as a category of renewables: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_electricity_production_from_renewable_sources https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_electri...
- consp 6y ago> The Texas storm was a 1 in a 100 year storm, so there was no way to plan for it, it was a black swan. Sure you can, people plan for far more rare occurrences. It costs money and will and nobody was willing to spend any. It is a tradeoff but saying you cannot plan for it is nonsense.