Reduce your carbon footprint - let the train take the strain

[Neil]

Sorry Phil it's not rot. Current world population and future life expectancy put us on a fixed trajectory of population growth (see the Hans Rosling video - page 4) which will then become stable but only over time, towards the end of this century. The stuff you suggest will have an impact, but only in 70-80 years time.

 

 

[Fenman]

16 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

... and equally demand every single piece of luggage must go through airport style security, then even a shorter journey time to London wo't have much effect.

...

 

I had a short trip a couple of weeks ago from Madrid to Segovia; every piece of luggage had to go through airport-style scanners at the entrance to the platforms. No-one seemed to care. 

 

Paul

[Mike Storey]

14 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

What rot!

 

There is LOTS which can be done without the need to resort to such heavy handed tactics - I have already mentioned one (gradual reducing child benefit the more children you chose to have)  which could be accompanied by other tax / benefit tweaks to adjust peoples behaviour. Naturally any such measures would need to be carefully thought out so as to not have 'cliff edge' type effects or penalise people who made decisions before such measures came into force but where there is will there is a way.

 

The other thing which could be done is to actually tell the truth about the devastating effect overpopulation has on the planet - just look at how the public have responded to the BBC's 'war ion plastic' documentary - orders for home deliveries of milk in reusable glass bottles has shot up even though it is more expensive by some margin directly off the back that one programme. A similar series looking at how increasing population has ravaged fish stocks, decimated wild animals habitat for farming, gobbled up land for housing, etc could make folk stop and think.
 

Such 'soft' measures might not have an immediate effect (changing human behaviours is never easy), nor satisfy your urge to see 'extreme measures' proposed so you can start claiming the moral high ground, - but they can have a powerful effect over time. Combined with other environmental initiatives and changes to the world economic order (e.g. using ever increasing GDP as the sole yardstick as to how we define economic success) the overall effect could be to make our planet a better place in the centuries to come

 

I refuse to believe that we, should sit back, throw our hands in the air and pretend there is nothing we can do or that it will somehow sort itself out in a few generations. Granted overpopulation is not the sole route by which our planet has ended up n the state it has - many other things have an effect too, but to turn around and try and pretend that the numbers of human beings on the planet is irrelevant is delusional.
 

With regards to population growth, human beings have created this problem (by being very clever and inventing modern medicine, modern farming, etc) which allowed us to rule the natural world with impunity. Now we have belatedly woken up to the damage we are doing to the planet we have a moral duty to fix it  - and reducing the numbers of people is just as much an integral part of that as preventing plastic pollution in our oceans etc.

 

 

 

 

There is every reason to agree with your assertion that overpopulation is a major cause of unsustainability in climate/natural habitats/over-use of intensive farming and chemicals etc etc. 

 

But your advocacy of financial/economic incentives to reduce birth rates makes little sense. The UK, and almost all western european nations, as well as Japan, the USA, Canada, Australia, Russia and even China, already have negative birth rates (i.e. not supporting replacement, all else being equal). Birth rates are still relatively high in mostly African countries, where child benefit or other economic assistance to individuals, is almost non-existent.

 

The fact is that birth rates are continuing to decline, primarily in conjunction with improved health support and increasing longevity. The UN charts these as being, on a world average, the Crude Birth Rate per thousand people, as:

 

1950 = 37.2

1980 = 27.9

2015 = 18.2 (UK = 12)

2050 = 13.4

 

This without any particular international stimulus to reduce rates, and with only very few national interventions, such as China, now relaxed. Various regional conflicts, disease outbreaks etc, do not affect this trend significantly.

 

Ergo, there is no need to apply any further pressure to reduce birth rates, so long as the trend in improved healthcare and longevity continues across to those countries which are still behind the developed world's averages. Which argues for continued Overseas Aid, even when it is widely reported that some of that aid is mis-used. We cannot force other countries to improve their healthcare and life expectancy rates, but it seems to be happening anyway.

 

Which is why I think we must face up to having to deal with a vastly over-populated world, unless we are proposing something rather more drastic, in which case, who gets to choose who lives and who dies? For anyone who thinks that is obviously preposterous, that is exactly what "we" (as in the developed world) were doing until several decades ago, by denying wealth (or indeed, removing it) from the third world, reducing healthcare and life expectancy for them. Some populist politicians are advocating a return to that, much to the delight of bloke down the pub, whilst at the same time saying coal mines should be re-opened, regulations reduced and that climate change is a hoax. Ain't life grand?

 

 

[phil-b259]

25 minutes ago, Neil said:

Sorry Phil it's not rot. Current world population and future life expectancy put us on a fixed trajectory of population growth (see the Hans Rosling video - page 4) which will then become stable but only over time, towards the end of this century. The stuff you suggest will have an impact, but only in 70-80 years time.

 

 

 

 

Sorry, but some species and environments don’t have the luxuary of waiting 80 years for things to stabilise. If current trends continue then vast numbers of species from Rhinos to Sharks will become extinct! (Hint if you let the numbers of people who think powdered Rhino horn is an afrodysiac or the number of folk who think shark fin soup is a delicacy then what do you think happens).

 

Much the same can be said about greenhouse gas emotions, deforestation, etc

 

Now, yes we can all turn round and say ‘don’t consume these things’ or ‘don’t burn fossil fuels’ - but guess what it’s going to take around 80 years before that message gets through because it needs cultural and economic change to take place in the relevant societies. The same is true of industrial pollution, deforestation etc.....

 

The planet requires a whoseale change of human mindset - there needs to be less of us, consuming less of the natural world resources and making sure of those resources we do use, we make sure we find ways of returning them to nature at the end of their lifecycle in a way that the planet can deal with. Pretending overpopulation is somehow not a problem, or that it will sort itself out in time only repeats the mistakes that have already been made in other areas - many of which we are only now finally starting to do something about long after the warning signs were there.

 

I freely admit to not having all the solutions but a rigerious scientific approach is to ideniffy ALL contributing factors - not simply gloss over some because they give rise to problematic thoughts in our moral compass as it were.

 

 

[phil-b259]

31 minutes ago, Mike Storey said:

 

 

Which is why I think we must face up to having to deal with a vastly over-populated world, unless we are proposing something rather more drastic, in which case, who gets to choose who lives and who dies? 

 

 

 

 

Its not as crude as that - what we are talking about is effectively accelerating cultural change rather than sitting back and waiting 80 years for things to stabilise.

 

Researchers have proved for example that immigrants from the Indian sub continent to the UK are quick to reduce the number of children in subsequent generations due to the sudden immersion in a country when small families have been the norm for decades.

 

By contrast although improved medical care and rapid economic growth have made life much more ‘survivable’ as it were back in India, etc. the culture and perceptions are still in transition meaning that family size is not reducing nearly as fast.

 

If we were talking about comodaties rather than people, then faced with an imbalance the logical thing to do is to even each side out so they are equal, by redestribution - note just keep adding more to a achieve balance. Thus it’s perfectly possible in theoretical terms to shorter that 80 year time frame till global population stability is reached by encouraging excess population in one place to move to another.

 

This has two benifits, it means the birth rate in the new country can continue to remain low, while also subjecting those from a high birth rate country to low birth rate conditions (which as I said has been proven to occur in the UK) and thus shortening the timeframe necessary for the cultural changes to occur.

 

This technique also allows the Governments of developing countries to not be overwhelmed by rapid population growth leading to a less chaotic situation when it comes to providing land for housing, or the provision of essential services and by extension gives the natural world more of a chance of surviving until development is complete.

 

Now I am not a fool, I am quite awere that most folk are hostile to mass migration and that culture clashes can easily degenerate into terible things  so it’s extremely unlikely population growth reduction will actually happen - but the fact remains we have the ability to make it happen without the need to descend into the realms of mass murder (or other unpleasantness).

[melmoth]

1 hour ago, phil-b259 said:

 luxuary

 

afrodysiac

 

greenhouse gas emotions

 

 whoseale

 

 rigerious

 

ideniffy

 

17 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

If we were talking about comodaties rather than people, then faced with an imbalance the logical thing to do is to even each side out so they are equal, by redestribution - note just keep adding more to a achieve balance. 

 

This has two benifits, 

 

Now I am not a fool, I am quite awere that most folk are hostile to mass migration and that culture clashes can easily degenerate into terible things 

 

If you are dyslexic or in some other way disadvantaged in terms of  the written word, then I apologise in advance, but the basic errors just in your last two posts do not help to raise the presentation of your opinions (however valid they may be) above that of a barrack-room lawyer. I appreciate that spellcheckers are not always easy to use - particularly on mobiles or tablets, or when hastening to put your point across, but do yourself a favour...

 

For what it's worth, I really don't have any deeply held opinion on the wider discussion about global population levels etc, but it has been an informative and interesting read so far. Thanks chaps.

[Neil]

Phil, you seem not to understand that if we reduce the birth rate now we won't see a significant change for years because these changes will take a lifetime to work through. With advances in healthcare this may be longer than we would expect at this particular moment in time. Any means that would hasten population decline would be distasteful and unethical.

 

Edit: Also watch the video again, particularly the bit where it demonstrates the birthrate dramatically dropping in countries like India and China as healthcare improves. Population growth these days is fuelled by people living longer not by increasing birthrate.

Edited June 25, 2019 by Neil

[hayfield]

14 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

 

Not sure this is the correct thread to raise the topic - though it is worthy of discussion in its own right.

 

However it has not escaped the notice of astute observers that preventing the transportation of more than a mere token amount of alcohol (unless you fork out £30 to have it sent via Eurostar's special 'registered luggage service) probably has more to do with making things ready for a 'no deal' Brexit than anything else.

 

Eurostar have a history of limiting alcohol on problematic services (e.g. the ski train or during major sporting tournaments) and there was no need to be quite so draconian if preventing unruly behaviour was the only consideration at work here.

 

Note in a 'no deal' situation the old Duty free limits will immediately apply - and enforcing them for passengers with stuff in their luggage will be a big burden on cross border transport providers. If alcohol is required to be sent via the 'registered luggage service' then exact quantities will be known and any duty to be paid easily determined.

 

(Note as all luggage must go through X -ray scanners before boarding, hiding alcohol at the bottom of your bag won’t work)

 

 

 

Phil

 

Its a 2.5 hour journey, one bottle of wine per passenger, more than enough for that journey plus you can top up from either the bar or trolley.

 

If you cannot travel for 2 and a half hours without drinking more than a bottle of wine you have a serious problem. In fact if you cannot travel without an alcoholic drink you have a problem.

[Reorte]

8 hours ago, Neil said:

Phil, you seem not to understand that if we reduce the birth rate now we won't see a significant change for years because these changes will take a lifetime to work through. With advances in healthcare this may be longer than we would expect at this particular moment in time. Any means that would hasten population decline would be distasteful and unethical.

 

Edit: Also watch the video again, particularly the bit where it demonstrates the birthrate dramatically dropping in countries like India and China as healthcare improves. Population growth these days is fuelled by people living longer not by increasing birthrate.

 

Well we'd better get started at having fewer children right now then, because everything else is merely tinkering at the edges and will be ultimately pointless if the population doesn't decrease too. Heaven knows how we'll manage in the meantime, but "might not be able to turn fast enough to avoid disaster" isn't a reason to not bother turning at all. Sure, birth rates in some places are below replacement but there are still areas that have very high birth rates, and are thus seriously adding to the degree of sustainability issues in the future. That no-one's come up with a workable and ethical answer is not a reason to dismiss the point, it just reinforces the urgency of trying to find one.

 

As far as the contribution from increasing lifespans is concerned I wouldn't be surprised if the developed world has pretty much come close to hitting the limit there (the decrease in the UK being slightly due to other factors). We've not really managed to get any closer to curing old age than we ever have, we've just reduced the number of things that can finish us off before we get there. The maximum possible age doesn't seem to have gone up, but the chance of reaching it has.

 

How long the change will take its way to work through the system will vary from place to place (i.e. longer with those already having high birth rates and a young population).

 

The really thorny issue in tackling the problem are the barriers created by religion.

Edited June 25, 2019 by Reorte

[phil-b259]

6 hours ago, hayfield said:

 

 

Phil

 

Its a 2.5 hour journey, one bottle of wine per passenger, more than enough for that journey plus you can top up from either the bar or trolley.

 

If you cannot travel for 2 and a half hours without drinking more than a bottle of wine you have a serious problem. In fact if you cannot travel without an alcoholic drink you have a problem.

 

 

You are rather missing the point - the majority of alcohol carried by Eurostar passengers is not for on board consumption, it’s for them to take home to enjoy later.  Bottles of French wine and Belgian beer have been cited as examples of the sorts of things folk like to bring back as souvenirs of their trip.

 

Paying Eurostar an extra £30 for that privalige does strike me as a bit over the top - and Eurostar already have plenty of other ways to tackle the minority of passengers who drink to excess on board.

 

As such I suspect Brexit based preparations are the real culprit here -  citing the prevention of antisocial behaviour being a useful (if semi truthful) cover story.

 

 

[Mike Storey]

17 minutes ago, Reorte said:

 

Well we'd better get started at having fewer children right now then, because everything else is merely tinkering at the edges and will be ultimately pointless if the population doesn't decrease too. Heaven knows how we'll manage in the meantime, but "might not be able to turn fast enough to avoid disaster" isn't a reason to not bother turning at all.

 

How long the change will take its way to work through the system will vary from place to place (i.e. longer with those already having high birth rates and a young population).

 

The world is already having far fewer children. Trends show that the world birth rate will have gone down by another third, within 30 years from now, to roughly equilibrium.

 

The greatest effect on population growth is not family size now - it is that people are living far longer, all over the world. There is no humane answer to that, which is why some people keep trying to solve the wrong problem.

 

[Reorte]

1 minute ago, Mike Storey said:

 

The world is already having far fewer children. Trends show that the world birth rate will have gone down by another third, within 30 years from now, to roughly equilibrium.

 

The greatest effect on population growth is not family size now - it is that people are living far longer, all over the world. There is no humane answer to that, which is why some people keep trying to solve the wrong problem.

 

None of which changes the fact that it's a damned good idea to try to find ways of reducing that number quicker, and to the point where we've got a decline going on as rapidly as we can manage. It is not a question of trying to solve the wrong problem, current birth rates are still a problem even in the presence of other factors. People living longer just emphasises that even further; an increase in lifespan has to be accompanied by a decrease in birth rates whilst it's going on to avoid exacerbating the situation further.

 

And there are sections of society calling for more young people, blind to the pyramid scheme nature of what they're demanding. A lot appear to be in influential positions too...

[jjb1970]

On ‎24‎/‎06‎/‎2019 at 09:53, hayfield said:

 

So providing you have enough people its OK to pump billions of tons of pollution into the atmosphere ? As it happens both China and India are very wealthy countries, they just decide not to spread the wealth to all their citizens (like most other countries) Just look at the pollution around their major cities. They like most others should do more

 

 

A country with a population of over a billion can reasonably argue that it should not be expected to emit the same aggregated emissions as a country with a population of 65 million. If that was to be the case then it would be an argument that countries like Qatar shouldn't do anything whatsoever to reduce their hideously high per capita emissions. An Indian emits an awful lot less on average than a UK resident, when our emissions drop to the same level as India on a per capita basis then we can point fingers eastwards.

China is doing an awful lot to curb pollution (both global and local), their environmental regulations have been ramping up for years, they're getting to a point where many of their environmental controls are similar to European standards and in some areas of clean technology they're pulling ahead. China did exactly what the developed world did, they developed economically and then cleaned up later. I'd prefer they didn't do that but we are certainly in no position to criticise them for it given how our countries in the developed world were hardly in a rush to clean up our environments (most environmental regulations came long after the scientific evidence was clear).

[jjb1970]

On population growth, I feel it is another of those issues where people can agree on the problem but generally want a solution which inflicts the pain on somebody else. Economic development and education tend to address high birth rates, it's apparent that in emerging economies the new middle classes are tending to follow the nuclear family model and that as economies grow this middle class is becoming increasingly large. My wife is from one of those emerging economies, she has one sister and three brothers (and that wouldn't have been seen as a large family) but it is interesting that none of them have more than two children themselves.

[Mallard60022]

13 minutes ago, jjb1970 said:

On population growth, I feel it is another of those issues where people can agree on the problem but generally want a solution which inflicts the pain on somebody else. Economic development and education tend to address high birth rates, it's apparent that in emerging economies the new middle classes are tending to follow the nuclear family model and that as economies grow this middle class is becoming increasingly large. My wife is from one of those emerging economies, she has one sister and three brothers (and that wouldn't have been seen as a large family) but it is interesting that none of them have more than two children themselves.

Been waiting for the discussion to cool down and for this to be stated. My italics and bold state my agreement. 

What we have not mentioned yet is the 'unusual ways' in which 'Nature', for want of a better term, sometimes takes  a turn in dealing with certain situations. Mess with Nature at our peril; did I say that some weeks ago?

Phil

Edited June 25, 2019 by Mallard60022

[hayfield]

52 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

 

You are rather missing the point - the majority of alcohol carried by Eurostar passengers is not for on board consumption, it’s for them to take home to enjoy later.  Bottles of French wine and Belgian beer have been cited as examples of the sorts of things folk like to bring back as souvenirs of their trip.

 

Paying Eurostar an extra £30 for that privalige does strike me as a bit over the top - and Eurostar already have plenty of other ways to tackle the minority of passengers who drink to excess on board.

 

As such I suspect Brexit based preparations are the real culprit here -  citing the prevention of antisocial behaviour being a useful (if semi truthful) cover story.

 

 

 

I don't see it as a Brexit issue, but one of excess alcohol consumption by a minority of people causing problems with other travellers, I certainly cant see people carrying crates of beer on Eurostar as for saving a few quid on some bottles of wine. I will be going to italy this year starting with Eurostar, done it twice before and it was enough to struggle with our cases let alone wine to boot, granted if you want to bring some wine back go by car and make it worthwile

 

As for blaming Brexit ridiculous, especially when drunken behaviour has been cited. More like they want you to buy the wine off of them at an inflated price, commercial rather than political reason

[hayfield]

25 minutes ago, jjb1970 said:

 

A country with a population of over a billion can reasonably argue that it should not be expected to emit the same aggregated emissions as a country with a population of 65 million. If that was to be the case then it would be an argument that countries like Qatar shouldn't do anything whatsoever to reduce their hideously high per capita emissions. An Indian emits an awful lot less on average than a UK resident, when our emissions drop to the same level as India on a per capita basis then we can point fingers eastwards.

China is doing an awful lot to curb pollution (both global and local), their environmental regulations have been ramping up for years, they're getting to a point where many of their environmental controls are similar to European standards and in some areas of clean technology they're pulling ahead. China did exactly what the developed world did, they developed economically and then cleaned up later. I'd prefer they didn't do that but we are certainly in no position to criticise them for it given how our countries in the developed world were hardly in a rush to clean up our environments (most environmental regulations came long after the scientific evidence was clear).

 

 

We seem to be near the front of the queue when committing and sticking to our pollution agreements. lets go further and consume more of what we can produce rather than sourcing it from the other side of the world. And yes if the situation is to be stabilized then everyone from first to fourth world countries need to equally do their bit  

[phil-b259]

9 minutes ago, hayfield said:

 

I don't see it as a Brexit issue, but one of excess alcohol consumption by a minority of people causing problems with other travellers, I certainly cant see people carrying crates of beer on Eurostar as for saving a few quid on some bottles of wine. I will be going to italy this year starting with Eurostar, done it twice before and it was enough to struggle with our cases let alone wine to boot, granted if you want to bring some wine back go by car and make it worthwile

 

As for blaming Brexit ridiculous, especially when drunken behaviour has been cited. More like they want you to buy the wine off of them at an inflated price, commercial rather than political reason

 

Firstly you need to open your eyes more with regard to Brexit.

 

Most UK customer facing business are not going to blame Brexit for decisions which have an adverse effect on UK voters as they do not want to be 'blamed' in the media or the subject of boycotts by angry Brits - but talk to insiders and the need to restructure to take account of all eventualities, including us crashing out of the EU with no deal (and subject to full WTO tarifs / import export rules) is very much a necessity. In a no deal situation from 00:00 on the 1st of November all Eurostar passengers will immediately be required to pay duty on all goods imported into the EU or he UK - be it by boat, plane or train. Minimising the quantities which can be carried is an easy way of ensuring such a task does not become a bureaucratic nightmare or cause extra hassle / delays at check in by making you send it via their special luggage service.

 

Secondly nobody is saying that this measure has been introduced solely for Brexit - yes it does indeed tick the box as regards clamping down on alcohol fuelled behaviour on board, but such a blanket measure is a sledgehammer to crack a nut scenario. As I have pointed out before Eurostar has put in place severe alcohol restrictions in place before - but the difference is that ntill last year they were done on an evidence led basis / passenger profiling which in 99% of cases was quite successful at preventing problems without the need to resort to tarring all passengers with the same brush.

 

I also don't dispute that this move will have also have lead to an increase in on board sales, thus boosting revenue for their shareholders in Eurostar and making the imposition of such rules even more attractive.

 

So in summary, I still contend that the whole reason such draconian restrictions have been imposed is NOT just to prevent passengers becoming disruptive on board, it is in fact a combination of a desire to make more profits from on board sales a desire to make sure the operation is 'no deal ready, plus it obviously saves Eurostar the bother of maintaining the successful (if labour intensive) ‘evidence based’ approach.

 

As others have pointed out Eurosatr s a TRAIN not a plane – and if Virgin, LNER or SNCF are still able to find ways of dealing with the alcohol balance without such blanket restriction, then so can Eurostar.

 

 

[Nick C]

16 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

 

A country with a population of over a billion can reasonably argue that it should not be expected to emit the same aggregated emissions as a country with a population of 65 million. If that was to be the case then it would be an argument that countries like Qatar shouldn't do anything whatsoever to reduce their hideously high per capita emissions. An Indian emits an awful lot less on average than a UK resident, when our emissions drop to the same level as India on a per capita basis then we can point fingers eastwards.

China is doing an awful lot to curb pollution (both global and local), their environmental regulations have been ramping up for years, they're getting to a point where many of their environmental controls are similar to European standards and in some areas of clean technology they're pulling ahead. China did exactly what the developed world did, they developed economically and then cleaned up later. I'd prefer they didn't do that but we are certainly in no position to criticise them for it given how our countries in the developed world were hardly in a rush to clean up our environments (most environmental regulations came long after the scientific evidence was clear).

 

Another key point to mention is that a significant proportion of the emissions from the developing countries is in manufacturing - and most of the products are shipped to the west. So we cannot get on our high horse about their emissions when a lot of those emissions are directly attributable to our own consumption...

 

We in the west need to reduce the amount we consume - we cannot continue to have a new car every three years, a new phone every two, and so on. Nor can we continue to eat fresh everything all year round, instead we should be focusing on seasonal produce that's produced locally - I'm trying to practice what I preach here, with a 14 year old car and an allotment.

 

What we can, and should, also be doing is to help the developed countries to avoid making the same mistakes we made - much of Africa, for example, jumped straight from nothing to mobile phones, skipping land-lines completely. We should be helping them to do the same with other, more polluting industries - for example by skipping fossil-fuel electricity generation and going straight to renewables.

[hayfield]

16 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

 

Firstly you need to open your eyes more with regard to Brexit.

 

Most UK customer facing business are not going to blame Brexit for decisions which have an adverse effect on UK voters as they do not want to be 'blamed' in the media or the subject of boycotts by angry Brits - but talk to insiders and the need to restructure to take account of all eventualities, including us crashing out of the EU with no deal (and subject to full WTO tarifs / import export rules) is very much a necessity. In a no deal situation from 00:00 on the 1st of November all Eurostar passengers will immediately be required to pay duty on all goods imported into the EU or he UK - be it by boat, plane or train. Minimising the quantities which can be carried is an easy way of ensuring such a task does not become a bureaucratic nightmare or cause extra hassle / delays at check in by making you send it via their special luggage service.

 

Secondly nobody is saying that this measure has been introduced solely for Brexit - yes it does indeed tick the box as regards clamping down on alcohol fuelled behaviour on board, but such a blanket measure is a sledgehammer to crack a nut scenario. As I have pointed out before Eurostar has put in place severe alcohol restrictions in place before - but the difference is that ntill last year they were done on an evidence led basis / passenger profiling which in 99% of cases was quite successful at preventing problems without the need to resort to tarring all passengers with the same brush.

 

I also don't dispute that this move will have also have lead to an increase in on board sales, thus boosting revenue for their shareholders in Eurostar and making the imposition of such rules even more attractive.

 

So in summary, I still contend that the whole reason such draconian restrictions have been imposed is NOT just to prevent passengers becoming disruptive on board, it is in fact a combination of a desire to make more profits from on board sales a desire to make sure the operation is 'no deal ready, plus it obviously saves Eurostar the bother of maintaining the successful (if labour intensive) ‘evidence based’ approach.

 

As others have pointed out Eurosatr s a TRAIN not a plane – and if Virgin, LNER or SNCF are still able to find ways of dealing with the alcohol balance without such blanket restriction, then so can Eurostar.

 

 

 

Phil

 

I use Eurostar for holidays and unlike the French trains there is far less space for both passenger seating and baggage, so there is not as much room for excess baggage as there is on mainline european trains. However whilst I have travelled on quite a few european trains I have never seen a culture of drinking on the trains

 

As for brexit, looks like anything that happens is now going to be blamed on brexit, fake assumptions. Customs will be carried out at the railway station by Customs and Excise. Nothing to do with Eurostar or the ferry companies

 

Its a commercial decision made by Eurostar based on  a british culture of binge drinking by a few. Yes it could be said to be unfair to the majority, but as I said if you cannot last a couple of hours without a drink you have a problem, in fact we are allowed to take a bottle each which for the average person is more than ample. 

[jjb1970]

17 hours ago, hayfield said:

 

 

We seem to be near the front of the queue when committing and sticking to our pollution agreements. lets go further and consume more of what we can produce rather than sourcing it from the other side of the world. And yes if the situation is to be stabilized then everyone from first to fourth world countries need to equally do their bit  

 

No, we don't need to do our bit equally, those countries with the highest emissions have to do more. Those countries with the lowest emissions still have to reduce emissions, but not to anything like the same extent as those countries which emit the most. And that has to be based on a per-capita basis (or equivalent) to recognise the simple reality that the aggregated emissions of a country the size of China will be higher than for a country the size of Luxembourg for example. And it also has to recognise economic development, we have no right to demand that poor countries eschew economic development simply to give rich developed countries a softer ride in avoiding difficult and painful decisions.

[hayfield]

5 minutes ago, jjb1970 said:

 

No, we don't need to do our bit equally, those countries with the highest emissions have to do more. Those countries with the lowest emissions still have to reduce emissions, but not to anything like the same extent as those countries which emit the most. And that has to be based on a per-capita basis (or equivalent) to recognise the simple reality that the aggregated emissions of a country the size of China will be higher than for a country the size of Luxembourg for example. And it also has to recognise economic development, we have no right to demand that poor countries eschew economic development simply to give rich developed countries a softer ride in avoiding difficult and painful decisions.

 

Carefully dodged the question of actually keeping to the quotas we have signed up to, those who pollute most have to accept to clean up the most. Not only sign up to it but actually do it. 

[APOLLO]

1 hour ago, Nick C said:

 

 

We in the west need to reduce the amount we consume - we cannot continue to have a new car every three years, a new phone every two, and so on. Nor can we continue to eat fresh everything all year round, instead we should be focusing on seasonal produce that's produced locally - I'm trying to practice what I preach here, with a 14 year old car and an allotment.

 

I don't know about you lot in the west but us lot ooop north don't buy a new car every three years. Most of us that is.

 

Far too much keyboard warriorship everywhere these days. I.ve a 46 year old car , A Rover V8, 18 mpg, she,s depleted a few oilfields , bu**ered up the ozone layer and put as mucn CO2 in the atmosphere as a million farting cows in her time. 

 

Wonderful days ahead, especially when Boris gets us out of the madhouse !!!!!

 

Brit15

 

 

[Reorte]

2 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

 

No, we don't need to do our bit equally, those countries with the highest emissions have to do more. Those countries with the lowest emissions still have to reduce emissions, but not to anything like the same extent as those countries which emit the most. And that has to be based on a per-capita basis (or equivalent) to recognise the simple reality that the aggregated emissions of a country the size of China will be higher than for a country the size of Luxembourg for example. And it also has to recognise economic development, we have no right to demand that poor countries eschew economic development simply to give rich developed countries a softer ride in avoiding difficult and painful decisions.

The problem with a per capita basis is that it doesn't take into account the impact of population changes. The earlier-raised questions about population growth and decline notwithstanding a reduction caused by a smaller population, but still with the same emissions per capita, is still a valid reduction. And "it's the same per capita" doesn't cut it if you're growing your population. A low density country could look to us and say "it's not our fault you've bred like rabbits."

[jjb1970]

1 hour ago, Reorte said:

The problem with a per capita basis is that it doesn't take into account the impact of population changes. The earlier-raised questions about population growth and decline notwithstanding a reduction caused by a smaller population, but still with the same emissions per capita, is still a valid reduction. And "it's the same per capita" doesn't cut it if you're growing your population. A low density country could look to us and say "it's not our fault you've bred like rabbits."

 

There is some truth in that, but currently the countries which have been experiencing very rapid population growth (which also tend to be less developed countries) for the most part have low total emissions and also low per capita emissions. The other issue is that GHG emissions have a cumulative effect and dwell in the atmosphere, even if we eliminated emissions today we would still have a bit of a problem. Therefore whether you look at it from the perspective of absolute emissions today, per capita emissions today or cumulative GHG emissions in the atmosphere it is primarily a developed world problem. We created the problem and the developed world continues to emit more. Interestingly, despite China's one child policy to contain population growth there emissions have grown rapidly over the last 30 years because of their explosive economic expansion (although their per-capita emissions are still not that high).