So Cal Gas Bill Increase?

Only a fact in the carbon shill world.

CHIP OF SB: Burn wood, waste paper, waste oil. Yeah, why not? Who gives a rat's ass about air quality? Please step into the 21st century. It is a known fact that wood stoves and wood-burning fireplaces are inefficient heat sources and spew toxic particulate matter into the air. This includes waste oil:
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(source: thepublicsradio.org)
"When fossil fuels are burned, they release large amounts of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, into the air. Greenhouse gases trap heat in our atmosphere, causing global warming. "

4:50, I think natural gas is the best choice for home heating because it’s clean burning and abundant. We need to produce more natural gas and improve our infrastructure so it becomes cost effective again. Firewood is also an excellent source of energy. Dead wood in forest lands is destined to burn when the next wildfire occurs. Why not harvest it and utilize its energy by burning it in a wood stove? This seems like an obvious win-win for the forest and those who use the wood. One could make a compelling argument that electric heaters would be economical and environmentally friendly if they were run on nuclear power, and that could well be a long term solution. However, implementing energy policies that choke off the supply of natural gas and squeeze the poor with higher energy bills because people think it will make the air colder is hypocritical and just plain crazy. China produced a record amount of coal in the last year (and burned it) and has been rapidly increasing its coal production. This is how China generates the energy to make a substantial portion of the products we buy, including solar panels. Shafting the poor with higher bills while buying low cost imported products built with coal power is just plain wrong. If you buy Chinese (coal) products, you have no right to criticize someone for burning firewood, garbage, or waste oil to take some of sting out of their heating bills.

@6:54 PM
There is no such thing as a "clean burning" carbon based fuel. Maybe cleaner than coal, but that's it. Stop falling for the carbon shills' greenwashing attempts and propaganda.

Heating with wood is Carbon neutral (Green) as long as trees are planted to replace the firewood burned. We grow our own heat in a sustainable cycle. Proper stove and fuel management makes for a clean burn with little smoke. We do not burn trash, only dry Eucalyptus.

BS. Carbon in the wood that has been sequestered for years is released as CO2 that persists in the atmosphere for much longer, and you would have to plant many small trees to make up for the CO2 removal capabilities of the mature tree you kill.

BS on your BS! You know naught. We've planted 100's of trees and are Carbon neutral with wood heat. I harvest Eucs at 4-5 years when about 8" at the base. They re-sprout and the cycle continues. We also plant many non-firewood trees in our reforestation efforts. Whether Nat gas or electricity from nat gas, that is unsustainable fossil Carbon release. Global reforestation is the answer, not going without.

Sorry for your rationalization, but reforestation cannot sequester the carbon fast enough to offset the output rate of CO2 from burning wood.

Agricultural/brush burning can also be used as a way to sequester Carbon. Rather than turning brush into ash and CO2, as is common globally, by utilizing pyrolytic (oxygen deprived combustion) combustion techniques, we convert our waste brush to bio-char. Bio-char has been used for thousands of years for better soil/crops and lasts many centuries in the soil, locking up the Carbon. Permaculture Rules! The solutions to many of our problems are far more simple than our complex societal minds would allow us to entertain. K.I.S.S. and learn from the old ways ;-)

@12:30, You are wrong. Deforestation continues.THAT is the problem!!!! I agree that reforestation may not be able to offset the Carbon released by millions of years fossil fuel burn (coal, oil, gas), but it completely offsets wood heat, 100%. Sustainable permaculture rocks! We have never lived better or more affordably.

@12:30 so in the meantime we should probably burn something to cook and warm our home that releases less C02 than burning wood, like nat gas, while also pushing reforestation efforts.

Stop falling for the Carbon shills; or JUST BE COLD! Wood IS a clean burning Carbon based fuel with proper forestry techniques. Fossil=Bad; Wood=Good.

I realize you're invested in what you're doing, so you want to ignore anything contrary, but the sum total of the facts disagrees with your conclusion. Just like VOR, cherry pick away and dodge around.

@10:24, Let us sum some facts. Our electricity is 99% green/fossil free (primarily hydro). Our heat is green as stated, and we have a large wood fired kitchen stove/oven for cooking. We also have a gas stove, gasoline car, gasoline lawn mower and a chainsaw, but that is the extent of our fossil fuel use =Extremely low Carbon footprint. No cherry picking, just a very green, sustainable and affordable bottom line. Life is good.

Point out something cherry picked @10:24. FYI, cherry picked doesn't mean facts you don't want to acknowledge.

@8:29
That's exactly what it means and exactly what you do - ignore facts that don't fit your narrative. It's your signature move, along with deflecting.

The good things you do have no bearing on the fact that burning wood adds CO2 to the atmosphere at a rate you can't mitigate by planting another tree.

6:36 AM -

Sorry, but burning wood just doesn't cut it, not to mention particulate pollution.

https://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/2014-4-july-august/ask-mr-green/what-greener-fireplace-choice

@2:21, then an example in this thread of me cherry picking shouldn't be hard to provide.

@2:21 then it should be easy to provide an example of my cherry picking on this thread.

@2:30 / 32, you should probably tell that to the State of California, we have the most biomass power plants of any state and just last year Newsom signed legislation requiring electric companies to buy electricity from biomass plants. " Electricity is a byproduct of his biomass projects; “You do it for jobs, yes, but you do it for cleaner air, the ecosystem, and climate change benefits,”" https://e360.yale.edu/features/in-california-a-push-grows-to-turn-dead-trees-into-biomass-energy and https://biomassmagazine.com/articles/19354/new-california-law-promotes-the-continued-use-of-biomass-power

There seems to be a pervasive lack of understanding about how plants form wood and how wood decomposes. Plants use solar energy to absorb carbon from the CO2 in the air and turn it into wood. This stores the solar energy in the wood. Whether the wood decomposes, rots, gets eaten by termites, or burns in the next wildfire the energy stored in it is released and every molecule of CO2 that was absorbed in order to form the wood is returned to the air from which it came in the form of CO2. Therefore forests are carbon neutral. The living trees absorb CO2 and form wood, and the dead trees decompose or burn and release CO2 at the same rate it is absorbed by the living trees. Forests do not have some kind of magical power to pull CO2 out of the air and make it disappear from the earth. That’s not how chemistry works. Every molecule of CO2 must be accounted for in the formation and the decomposition of wood. This means that it makes no difference whether a dead tree falls over and gets eaten by termites in the forest or gets chopped up and burned in a fireplace. Either way, every molecule of CO2 that tree absorbed while it was alive will be returned to the air.

@2:30 tell that to the State of CA. Newsom signed legislation requiring utilities to buy power from biomass power plants and our state has more biomass power plants than any other. https://biomassmagazine.com/articles/19354/new-california-law-promotes-the-continued-use-of-biomass-power and https://e360.yale.edu/features/in-california-a-push-grows-to-turn-dead-trees-into-biomass-energy

Fun fact on that topic Chip, when we loose weight more than 80% is lost via our lungs in the form of C02.

Thank you Chip for a good explanation of the Carbon Cycle, that the ignorant might learn something. I would add that the use of biochar DOES sequester Carbon in the ground for centuries or millennia. It also makes the soil more healthy and productive as Humans have known for millennia. (we forget though)

Sounds like a much greener and less fossil fuel reliant way to fertilize the ground for farming over the current methods of petrochemical (oil) derived fertilizers or strip mining them from Africa and shipping them to the US: www.ciel.org/reports/fossil-fertilizers/#:~:text=But%20there%20is%20an%20often,driver%20of%20the%20climate%20crisis _and_ https://phys.org/news/2023-01-soil-available-phosphorus-mineral-fertilizers-agricultural.html

People saying that we should phase out of fossil fuels gradually as renewable resources become more prevalent and reliable doesn’t make a carbon shill. But go on with your buzz words …

"Gradually" is the shill word there. We need to end our use of carbon fuels rapidly, as anyone with any knowledge of the subject not tainted by propaganda would be aware. Spread that FUD!

Anyone who thinks it's possible to end the use of carbon fuels rapidly without drastic negative consequences for the lower and middle class is a "climate shill" tainted by propaganda. And that's just in the United States. If you try and do that globally, which would be required if meaningful change to our planet was the goal, It would create mass famine and political instability, erase all the gains undeveloped countries have made over the past 50 years, and cause more death than a changing climate ever would. Gradual means as more green generation comes online, the dirtiest forms like coal are eliminated. Nat gas, being the cleanest and abundant, is a critically necessary bridge to get there while making significant C02 reeducations without impact the global quality of life. I'm sure this poster @ 10:53 must drive an electric car charged by solar panels on their home, with electric only cooking/heating, forgos the use of plastics and grows their own food (can't have those diesel trucks and farm equipment getting the food to the grocery store) - otherwise just another climate shill spreading FUD.

Bravo!

PDX - thank you for the rational thought.

The hypocrisy of the elite eco-warriors demanding everyone else do with less to "save the planet" while they fly around in private jets between multiple mansions and their mega-yachts is absolutely astounding.

VOICE - that IS hypocritical, but it doesn't make the fact that we need to cut back on greenhouse emissions wrong, nor is it as prevalent as the NY Post and Fox make it sound.

It is absolutely as prevalent as the NY Post and Fox make it sound. Just 1% of people cause 50% of the global aviation C02 emissions. The 1% produce as much emissions as the poorest half (3+ BILLION) poorest people. https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/carbon-emissions-richest-1-percent-more-
double-emissions-poorest-half-humanity https://www.transportenvironment.org/discover/private
-jets-can-the-super-rich-supercharge-zero-emission-aviation/ https://www.greenpeace.org/international/ce-delft_co2-emissions-from-private-flights-to-the-world
-economic-forum/
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So just ignore that part about it not meaning we shouldn't cut back on emissions..... typical.

Further, how many of that 1% are "eco warriors?" Simply being a liberal or publicly saying we should address climate change doesn't make one a "warrior." How many of that 1% are gas/oil/coal CEOs?

Again, just because some are hypocritical, doesn't mean you get to throw up your arms and walk away from the problem.

Firewood is an excellent source of heat, and for those who are concerned about it firewood is completely carbon neutral. Firewood is really a form of solar power. Trees harness the sun’s energy to absorb CO2 and turn it into wood. The tree dies and gets burned and the CO2 is returned to the air where it came from and someone gets to enjoy the warmth and the light of its flame.

ANDREA (and everyone else) - I apologize for my earlier comment about the increase being nominal and not going to bankrupt anyone, that was tone-deaf.

That said, ANDREA, you're absolutely right. We need to do something, but first we need to all understand this is what capitalism does. Instead of wasting tears on Biden (you know who I'm talking to here), take it up with the corporate thieves who are doing this to us. So much misplaced blame! No wonder we can't ever get anything fixed in this country!

While this specific situation between SCE and Sempra certainly smells funny and there have been calls for investigation (see link below), Biden's policies have certainly exacerbated the problem. To deny Biden's energy polies have had a direct and significant negative impact on domestic energy costs (their intended effect) is to deny reality. It makes absolutely zero economic or environmental sense to restrict domestic production while encouraging foreign countries, many with horrible human rights records and environmental controls, to produce and export more to the US. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/consumer-watchdog-calls-for-investigation-into-so-cal-gas-natural-price-spikes-points-to-evidence-utility-colluded-with-parent-company-sempra-to-drive-up-price-on-customers-301726179.html