Off-grid living in NYC
January 19, 2023 8:05 AM Subscribe
What started as an experiment has turned into a habit I hope will inspire others. I disconnected from the electric grid for 8 months—in Manhattan.
It seemed interesting until I saw the article was broken up into multiple web pages for maximum ad impressions. I realize that isn't the author's fault.
I'd like to use this opportunity to plug lowtechmagazine.com if you're interested in this. He lives in sunnier Spain but puts immense effort into his content.
posted by jellywerker at 8:22 AM on January 19, 2023 [7 favorites]
I'd like to use this opportunity to plug lowtechmagazine.com if you're interested in this. He lives in sunnier Spain but puts immense effort into his content.
posted by jellywerker at 8:22 AM on January 19, 2023 [7 favorites]
Bluetti has some interesting battery systems, if you proceed down this path, with a range of capacities. I kinda like their AC500, combined with B300 batteries, although as a homeowner I'm personally looking at a non-portable solution presently.
posted by aramaic at 8:26 AM on January 19, 2023
posted by aramaic at 8:26 AM on January 19, 2023
Calling it "off-grid" is a bit of a stretch, but I appreciate that the writer is honest that some of these energy savings are just being passed externally (charging at work, eating out more, etc.) - one of the benefits of living in a city that you don't often hear about in the off-grid/homestead adjacent community.
Still, reducing consumption is a fun and noble goal, and it is wild how much this genre of article annoys people in the comments.
posted by Think_Long at 8:32 AM on January 19, 2023 [17 favorites]
Still, reducing consumption is a fun and noble goal, and it is wild how much this genre of article annoys people in the comments.
posted by Think_Long at 8:32 AM on January 19, 2023 [17 favorites]
He says he used his pressure cooker to make 5 stew meals at a time, but didn't say how he kept them from spoiling without a fridge. Does he have more food waste?
posted by ceejaytee at 8:37 AM on January 19, 2023 [10 favorites]
posted by ceejaytee at 8:37 AM on January 19, 2023 [10 favorites]
I will revisit this for sure when it is not the 43rd day in a row of complete cloud cover where I live lol.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 8:46 AM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 8:46 AM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]
Still, reducing consumption is a fun and noble goal, and it is wild how much this genre of article annoys people in the comments.
Because this nonsense is the absurd end result of the poisonous yet pervasive idea that society-level or general infrastructure-level issues can or even should be a matter of individual personal responsibility. The sooner we kill that idea, the sooner we can get real change instead of stunts like this.
It's endlessly baffling to me how people on the left rightly laugh at conservatives screeching about "personal responsibility" when attaching the poor, correctly recognizing that the causes of poverty are systemic, but whole-heartedly embrace it when it comes to the environment.
posted by star gentle uterus at 8:48 AM on January 19, 2023 [48 favorites]
Because this nonsense is the absurd end result of the poisonous yet pervasive idea that society-level or general infrastructure-level issues can or even should be a matter of individual personal responsibility. The sooner we kill that idea, the sooner we can get real change instead of stunts like this.
It's endlessly baffling to me how people on the left rightly laugh at conservatives screeching about "personal responsibility" when attaching the poor, correctly recognizing that the causes of poverty are systemic, but whole-heartedly embrace it when it comes to the environment.
posted by star gentle uterus at 8:48 AM on January 19, 2023 [48 favorites]
Because it's a complex issue rather than a binary one. It should not 100% be the government's responsibility to make me consume less, but it should be the government's responsibility to provide, say, clean electricity and public transportation.
posted by gwint at 8:52 AM on January 19, 2023 [13 favorites]
posted by gwint at 8:52 AM on January 19, 2023 [13 favorites]
I loved this, thanks. More for the clarity and curiosity with which he described his thought process and lessons learned than for any one technical detail about the "challenge".
posted by dusty potato at 8:54 AM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by dusty potato at 8:54 AM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
It seemed interesting until I saw the article was broken up into multiple web pages for maximum ad impressions.
? It's coming through as just one page for me.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:57 AM on January 19, 2023 [9 favorites]
? It's coming through as just one page for me.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:57 AM on January 19, 2023 [9 favorites]
Regarding this particular effort, I appreciate it (especially how he approached it as an interesting experiment and a way to be more thoughtful about how he lived and what he considered important, rather than some prescriptive "I did it, and so can you!" way), although... the majority of home energy use for most people is climate control (heat, A/C, hot water, fridge) which he either doesn't mention or is a bit hand-wavy about.
posted by gwint at 8:58 AM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by gwint at 8:58 AM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
this nonsense is the absurd end result of the poisonous yet pervasive idea that society-level or general infrastructure-level issues can or even should be a matter of individual personal responsibility. The sooner we kill that idea,
I agree and I disagree. It's almost as if ...
it's a complex issue rather than a binary one.
posted by philip-random at 8:58 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
I agree and I disagree. It's almost as if ...
it's a complex issue rather than a binary one.
posted by philip-random at 8:58 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
While I wholeheartedly agree that it will absolutely take institutional/governmental/global level intervention to enact meaningful change w/r/t climate action, I also embrace the "if you're not part of the solution you're part of the problem" ethos. It's not necessary to go to the lengths that this person goes to, but if embracing some or the more practical ideas give any individual a smaller footprint that seems like a net good.
posted by OHenryPacey at 8:59 AM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by OHenryPacey at 8:59 AM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
When I scroll down, I briefly see the pagination controls before it gets replaced with more content. It ends up looking like one big page. It's the modern web, I suppose - complicated and broken.
posted by meowzilla at 8:59 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by meowzilla at 8:59 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
I don't like attempts to turn systematic problems into failures of personal responsibility, but, at the same time, you should strive to make your life reflect your values as far as you can as a fallible and limited human being within the system. There's nothing wrong with this.
posted by praemunire at 9:02 AM on January 19, 2023 [13 favorites]
posted by praemunire at 9:02 AM on January 19, 2023 [13 favorites]
the majority of home energy use for most people is climate control (heat, A/C, hot water, fridge) which he either doesn't mention or is a bit hand-wavy about.
He actually did mention turning off his fridge, though I wished he'd discussed it further, because that struck me as probably one of the most drastic quality-of-life adjustments covered. I guess that is one area where one could really lean into the unique benefits of living in a highest-density area like Manhattan; if you had a food store on your block you could conceivably just buy refrigerated food in small quantities every meal as needed.
posted by dusty potato at 9:05 AM on January 19, 2023 [14 favorites]
He actually did mention turning off his fridge, though I wished he'd discussed it further, because that struck me as probably one of the most drastic quality-of-life adjustments covered. I guess that is one area where one could really lean into the unique benefits of living in a highest-density area like Manhattan; if you had a food store on your block you could conceivably just buy refrigerated food in small quantities every meal as needed.
posted by dusty potato at 9:05 AM on January 19, 2023 [14 favorites]
This is interesting. Sure as fuck isn't going to inspire me but it is interesting.
posted by kingdead at 9:08 AM on January 19, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by kingdead at 9:08 AM on January 19, 2023 [6 favorites]
The comments I posted.
1/2 Heat was likely provided by the building's central boiler. What about AC? Many, many Americans will not live without it. The article is about an individual trying to go solar. Great. But there are obviously so many problems for an individual trying to re-create the infrastructure for modern life, and it makes it look like solar is not very useful for most of us.
But if rooftop solar panels were commonplace, that power would displace a lot of coal- or oil-generated electricity, with the environmental cost being the cost of producing, installing, and eventually recycling panels. Many NYC roofs used to have water tanks, the structural load from panels is far less.
Texas has shown that even a large state with lots of population is in trouble if it isn't tied in to a larger system and if it relies on 1 major source of fuel. If you're at a high latitude, you get to make lots of electricity in summer, and use something else in your dark winter. You could cut power costs substantially, with the corresponding reduction in carbon emissions. For the most part, demand is high in summer because of AC; so make power with the sun when you really need it.
Other countries like Germany have figured this out. In the US, the fossil fuel industry lobbies our government and lies to consumers, but solar and wind could be supplying a significant amount of our electricity, not just reducing carbon, but air pollution, too. A power grid with diverse production is likely to be a lot more stable.
2/2 Scalability is not mentioned. Most people aren't willing to give up meat, and I don't know anybody willing to give up refrigeration. The food safety issues of making food for 5 meals and not refrigerating it are Nope. Many of us don't have access to effective public transportation, but should.
I didn't read all the comments, but they mostly describe why this wouldn't work for them. Relying on individual change isn't going to fix Climate Crisis, though if people stopped flying so much, that would be a huge help. What happens if 10 of your neighbors want to use the roof for their panels? Individual effort will make a difference, but it has to be combined with systemic change.
posted by theora55 at 9:18 AM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
1/2 Heat was likely provided by the building's central boiler. What about AC? Many, many Americans will not live without it. The article is about an individual trying to go solar. Great. But there are obviously so many problems for an individual trying to re-create the infrastructure for modern life, and it makes it look like solar is not very useful for most of us.
But if rooftop solar panels were commonplace, that power would displace a lot of coal- or oil-generated electricity, with the environmental cost being the cost of producing, installing, and eventually recycling panels. Many NYC roofs used to have water tanks, the structural load from panels is far less.
Texas has shown that even a large state with lots of population is in trouble if it isn't tied in to a larger system and if it relies on 1 major source of fuel. If you're at a high latitude, you get to make lots of electricity in summer, and use something else in your dark winter. You could cut power costs substantially, with the corresponding reduction in carbon emissions. For the most part, demand is high in summer because of AC; so make power with the sun when you really need it.
Other countries like Germany have figured this out. In the US, the fossil fuel industry lobbies our government and lies to consumers, but solar and wind could be supplying a significant amount of our electricity, not just reducing carbon, but air pollution, too. A power grid with diverse production is likely to be a lot more stable.
2/2 Scalability is not mentioned. Most people aren't willing to give up meat, and I don't know anybody willing to give up refrigeration. The food safety issues of making food for 5 meals and not refrigerating it are Nope. Many of us don't have access to effective public transportation, but should.
I didn't read all the comments, but they mostly describe why this wouldn't work for them. Relying on individual change isn't going to fix Climate Crisis, though if people stopped flying so much, that would be a huge help. What happens if 10 of your neighbors want to use the roof for their panels? Individual effort will make a difference, but it has to be combined with systemic change.
posted by theora55 at 9:18 AM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
I didn't feel like his overall point was about individualism vs societal level solutions. The stuff about needing to find lifestyles that don't require 24-7 power at the beginning resonated with me. With climate change, there seems to be more and more vulnerability in the grid but we have all these things in our lives that rely on always on power. We may have no choice but learn to deal with rolling brownouts or occasional outages better than we currently do and if that learning to deal also allows us to better use more sustainable energy sources, so much the better.
posted by jacquilynne at 9:21 AM on January 19, 2023 [7 favorites]
posted by jacquilynne at 9:21 AM on January 19, 2023 [7 favorites]
(Also, he mentions he is vegan, and tbh I can't think of a lot of vegan ingredients, even leafy greens, that will be unsafe/inedible the next day rather than just slightly worse for the wear, if kept in a dark, dry, non-refrigerated location.)
posted by dusty potato at 9:22 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by dusty potato at 9:22 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
I own a small travel trailer. It is very very easy to add portable panels, inexpensive batteries (several different flavors) an inexpensive inverter and use many basic appliances: laptops, small fridges, TVs, etc. None of this is hard. There are many small appliances that use hardly any power at all, and a simple panel/battery setup can easily do this.
When you step up to items that "make heat", like an Instapot, etc, then you would need more battery, in many cases. As the wattage climbs, you need larger "infrastructure". More panel wattage, larger battery banks. With a 200 watt panel and two 100 amp hour batteries (and sun, and a little planning) anyone can easily live "off grid", as this guy did. Right now, with my small portable setup, I can easily power most of the "back" of my house, the bedrooms, etc. With a little more input, I could power my entire "office" of desktop, printer, stereo, etc.
You don't need your panels "on the roof", as long as your living arrangements include you being able to see the sun for a decent part of the day.
Solar is not hard: if you could connect a VCR back in the day, you can wire up a solar setup. People get all hung up on "its electricity!" AHH....but it isn't difficult. Many thousands of small campers are out in the wild even today, using battery power and solar (and propane, probably, for heat!) and living "small" and comfortably.
I wish the solar industry would react to people who don't want to add 15,000 dollars worth of panels to the roof, power the home and sell excess power back to the power companies, etc. Give me a simple system that can handle the "back" side of my home for much less money and let me go from there.
posted by pthomas745 at 9:22 AM on January 19, 2023 [19 favorites]
When you step up to items that "make heat", like an Instapot, etc, then you would need more battery, in many cases. As the wattage climbs, you need larger "infrastructure". More panel wattage, larger battery banks. With a 200 watt panel and two 100 amp hour batteries (and sun, and a little planning) anyone can easily live "off grid", as this guy did. Right now, with my small portable setup, I can easily power most of the "back" of my house, the bedrooms, etc. With a little more input, I could power my entire "office" of desktop, printer, stereo, etc.
You don't need your panels "on the roof", as long as your living arrangements include you being able to see the sun for a decent part of the day.
Solar is not hard: if you could connect a VCR back in the day, you can wire up a solar setup. People get all hung up on "its electricity!" AHH....but it isn't difficult. Many thousands of small campers are out in the wild even today, using battery power and solar (and propane, probably, for heat!) and living "small" and comfortably.
I wish the solar industry would react to people who don't want to add 15,000 dollars worth of panels to the roof, power the home and sell excess power back to the power companies, etc. Give me a simple system that can handle the "back" side of my home for much less money and let me go from there.
posted by pthomas745 at 9:22 AM on January 19, 2023 [19 favorites]
The stuff about needing to find lifestyles that don't require 24-7 power at the beginning resonated with me.
Thing is...if we're not to revert to the dangerous and unhealthy light sources of the past, we are left able to do very little at all for the long winter nights. Not being even able to read (or knit!) or leave my apartment under non-emergency conditions (I live on a high floor of a high rise) from about 4:30 pm until the next morning is a non-starter. I don't think most Western people fully appreciate how severely restricted a world limited to natural light sources (to say nothing of natural temperature variations) can be, because most of us have never come close to living in it. Among other things, power is needed to make density possible. Even if I were able to climb [mumble] flights on the regular, the temperatures in the summer up here would be literally deadly.
posted by praemunire at 9:34 AM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]
Thing is...if we're not to revert to the dangerous and unhealthy light sources of the past, we are left able to do very little at all for the long winter nights. Not being even able to read (or knit!) or leave my apartment under non-emergency conditions (I live on a high floor of a high rise) from about 4:30 pm until the next morning is a non-starter. I don't think most Western people fully appreciate how severely restricted a world limited to natural light sources (to say nothing of natural temperature variations) can be, because most of us have never come close to living in it. Among other things, power is needed to make density possible. Even if I were able to climb [mumble] flights on the regular, the temperatures in the summer up here would be literally deadly.
posted by praemunire at 9:34 AM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]
Among other things, power is needed to make density possible.
? This is historically inaccurate.
posted by dusty potato at 9:43 AM on January 19, 2023
? This is historically inaccurate.
posted by dusty potato at 9:43 AM on January 19, 2023
? This is historically inaccurate.
The density we are talking about here is well beyond historical, pre-20C density and also entails maintaining modern health and safety standards. I'm kind of at a loss as to how you think modern density is to be obtained without elevators, for instance.
posted by praemunire at 9:48 AM on January 19, 2023 [7 favorites]
The density we are talking about here is well beyond historical, pre-20C density and also entails maintaining modern health and safety standards. I'm kind of at a loss as to how you think modern density is to be obtained without elevators, for instance.
posted by praemunire at 9:48 AM on January 19, 2023 [7 favorites]
Among other things, power is needed to make density possible.
? This is historically inaccurate.
Do...you have a reference for a pre-fuel city with a population density of 72,918 people per square mile (the current density of Manhattan)?
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 9:50 AM on January 19, 2023
? This is historically inaccurate.
Do...you have a reference for a pre-fuel city with a population density of 72,918 people per square mile (the current density of Manhattan)?
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 9:50 AM on January 19, 2023
Thing is...if we're not to revert to the dangerous and unhealthy light sources of the past, we are left able to do very little at all for the long winter nights.
Or to use non-grid based solutions like localized energy storage. This guy didn't not use lights, he didn't use the grid to power them.
posted by jacquilynne at 9:53 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Or to use non-grid based solutions like localized energy storage. This guy didn't not use lights, he didn't use the grid to power them.
posted by jacquilynne at 9:53 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Am about to get some solar panels for our invertor. At the moment the invertor makes it possible run our internet, computer, lights, and various other bits and pieces while we have loadshedding (several hours a day at the moment).
But loadshedding keeps getting worse, and I think it's pretty much going to be that way from now on.
Biggest challenge is the fridge. Can't afford an invertor powerful enough for that kind of thing.
Have lived without a fridge before.
But it's not our personal situation that worries me. The knock on effect for everything else is going to be intense. Food supply chain, small businesses, all the rest of it.
Me keeping my fridge cool is really not my main concern.
posted by Zumbador at 9:54 AM on January 19, 2023 [5 favorites]
But loadshedding keeps getting worse, and I think it's pretty much going to be that way from now on.
Biggest challenge is the fridge. Can't afford an invertor powerful enough for that kind of thing.
Have lived without a fridge before.
But it's not our personal situation that worries me. The knock on effect for everything else is going to be intense. Food supply chain, small businesses, all the rest of it.
Me keeping my fridge cool is really not my main concern.
posted by Zumbador at 9:54 AM on January 19, 2023 [5 favorites]
I wouldn't worry about light sources so much--we've made light super energy efficient and it works super well for long periods off of the current battery tech we have. While we might not be able to light things to the extent that we do now, here's a solution that runs for 12 hours on 7 hours of sunlight. You can even get 15 lumens of light from solutions that don't require sun or battery but just a gravity weight; that effort was discontinued because other methods are more useful even in areas without solid electricity but it shows how efficient we've gotten lighting to be.
posted by foxfirefey at 9:55 AM on January 19, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by foxfirefey at 9:55 AM on January 19, 2023 [5 favorites]
What about AC? Many, many Americans will not live without it.
Indeed, many Americans die because of a lack of it.
posted by entropone at 10:05 AM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]
Indeed, many Americans die because of a lack of it.
posted by entropone at 10:05 AM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]
re: the author's point about intermittency - I read this piece about a dam/reservoir system in Portugal. When solar and wind can't provide enough power, they release water from the upper reservoir, power a turbine, and create electricity. When solar and wind are providing more than enough for the grid, they use that energy to pump the water from the lower reservoir back to the upper. It's a hydro battery charged by solar and wind.
Hard to do this on the personal scale, but on the larger scale, it's a pretty clever solve to intermittency.
posted by entropone at 10:09 AM on January 19, 2023 [7 favorites]
Hard to do this on the personal scale, but on the larger scale, it's a pretty clever solve to intermittency.
posted by entropone at 10:09 AM on January 19, 2023 [7 favorites]
Today I experienced again how deeply weird it is to be in a supermarket when the power goes off.
Suddenly you realise, hey, NO NATURAL LIGHT AT ALL and this place is basically a cave. Full of stuff. That no one is watching.
posted by Zumbador at 10:15 AM on January 19, 2023 [7 favorites]
Suddenly you realise, hey, NO NATURAL LIGHT AT ALL and this place is basically a cave. Full of stuff. That no one is watching.
posted by Zumbador at 10:15 AM on January 19, 2023 [7 favorites]
I wish the solar industry would react to people who don't want to add 15,000 dollars worth of panels to the roof,
Indeed; I just got off a meeting with a major solar provider who won't sell me a battery, because my 3.2kW system is too small, so I'd need more panels, but they won't install anything less than 3kW -- so to get a battery I'd need to go all the way up to 6.2kW, rather than just adding the three dang panels I *actually* need to meet their charging minimum.
dam/reservoir system in Portugal
It's amazing they got it built without GOP terrorists busting in to shoot up the place, but Raccoon Mountain is a pumped storage system in the US. It's fairly nifty, but don't tell any modern Republicans about it or they might start loading their truck bombs.
posted by aramaic at 10:16 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Indeed; I just got off a meeting with a major solar provider who won't sell me a battery, because my 3.2kW system is too small, so I'd need more panels, but they won't install anything less than 3kW -- so to get a battery I'd need to go all the way up to 6.2kW, rather than just adding the three dang panels I *actually* need to meet their charging minimum.
dam/reservoir system in Portugal
It's amazing they got it built without GOP terrorists busting in to shoot up the place, but Raccoon Mountain is a pumped storage system in the US. It's fairly nifty, but don't tell any modern Republicans about it or they might start loading their truck bombs.
posted by aramaic at 10:16 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
I am fascinated at signing the name with “PhD, MBA”. It’s like, I should listen to this person / no I shouldn’t.
As someone who is getting an MBA type degree soon, I’m curious if my feelings will change when I have one.
posted by BeeDo at 10:27 AM on January 19, 2023 [6 favorites]
As someone who is getting an MBA type degree soon, I’m curious if my feelings will change when I have one.
posted by BeeDo at 10:27 AM on January 19, 2023 [6 favorites]
Re: the non-refrigeration thing - I had a vegan friend who claimed that vegans aren't at risk for food poisoning. I assume that if this is true, you could rely on a dark cool space like a closet to store your perishables.
posted by PatchesPal at 10:29 AM on January 19, 2023
posted by PatchesPal at 10:29 AM on January 19, 2023
Most people aren't willing to give up meat
Literally just yesterday the city of Edinburgh signed the plant-based treaty.
posted by aniola at 10:30 AM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
Literally just yesterday the city of Edinburgh signed the plant-based treaty.
posted by aniola at 10:30 AM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
I had a vegan friend who claimed that vegans aren't at risk for food poisoning
This person is very very wrong. Lettuce is a major vector for food poisoning in fast food. Garlic in oil at room temperature risks botulism.
posted by foxfirefey at 10:35 AM on January 19, 2023 [32 favorites]
Do...you have a reference for a pre-fuel city with a population density of 72,918 people per square mile (the current density of Manhattan)?
That's 28,153.8 people per square kilometer. This article puts the population density of ancient Rome at roughly 24,158/km2, and possibly as high as 31,700. (I wouldn't want to live there, though!)
posted by Gerald Bostock at 10:37 AM on January 19, 2023 [5 favorites]
That's 28,153.8 people per square kilometer. This article puts the population density of ancient Rome at roughly 24,158/km2, and possibly as high as 31,700. (I wouldn't want to live there, though!)
posted by Gerald Bostock at 10:37 AM on January 19, 2023 [5 favorites]
Do...you have a reference for a pre-fuel city with a population density of 72,918 people per square mile (the current density of Manhattan)?
Also, pre-conquest Tenochtitlan (Mexico City, also an island at the time) was probably around that density as well (though estimates of the population vary).
posted by ssg at 10:43 AM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
Also, pre-conquest Tenochtitlan (Mexico City, also an island at the time) was probably around that density as well (though estimates of the population vary).
posted by ssg at 10:43 AM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
>>It seemed interesting until I saw the article was broken up into multiple web pages for maximum ad impressions.
>It's coming through as just one page for me.
I saw it as multiple pages as well. The default view is multiple pages. They have some javascript that loads the pages automagically, but only if you allow javascript from another site to run. Many security/ad/privacy oriented plugins will block this by default, so you get the default multi page view.
posted by mrgoldenbrown at 10:45 AM on January 19, 2023
>It's coming through as just one page for me.
I saw it as multiple pages as well. The default view is multiple pages. They have some javascript that loads the pages automagically, but only if you allow javascript from another site to run. Many security/ad/privacy oriented plugins will block this by default, so you get the default multi page view.
posted by mrgoldenbrown at 10:45 AM on January 19, 2023
Pumped storage hydro is pretty widely deployed and it’s interesting to note that almost as many plants are being built as already exist. Almost all new construction is in China.
It can be challenging to find suitable sites with the ability to create two large basins sufficiently different in altitude and with enough available water. Some systems, perhaps most, serve dual functions of water and energy storage. All the usual objections to new dams apply of course.
posted by sjswitzer at 10:45 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
It can be challenging to find suitable sites with the ability to create two large basins sufficiently different in altitude and with enough available water. Some systems, perhaps most, serve dual functions of water and energy storage. All the usual objections to new dams apply of course.
posted by sjswitzer at 10:45 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
That's 28,153.8 people per square kilometer. This article puts the population density of ancient Rome at roughly 24,158/km2, and possibly as high as 31,700. (I wouldn't want to live there, though!)
Also, pre-conquest Tenochtitlan (Mexico City, also an island at the time) was probably around that density as well (though estimates of the population vary).
And a life expectancy of ...?
posted by Melismata at 10:47 AM on January 19, 2023
Also, pre-conquest Tenochtitlan (Mexico City, also an island at the time) was probably around that density as well (though estimates of the population vary).
And a life expectancy of ...?
posted by Melismata at 10:47 AM on January 19, 2023
Personally I still hope for fully automated gay space communism.
It does seem to me that there is a big gap between this utter minimalism, and wasteful mindless use of energy, where a sustainable and comfortable life is possible. My partner and I live in 101 unefficiently laid-out square metres, which is a lot (1087 square feet). In a climate where winter temps are -2 or -3 C at the lowest, and 31 or 32 C on the hottest summer days, we use around 6000kWh annually for heating and cooling and all our appliances. I think we can do better than that. And we generated around 5000kWh from our rooftop solar. It's not hard to imagine a future where rooftop solar is part of a standard build, dwellings are better laid out and insulated than our modernised but 1950s house, domestic and neighbourhood batteries help with timeshifting electricity demand, and so on.
On the personal responsibility front, it is FULLY valid to live in a way most consistent with your ethics, and from that standpoint, I applaud. As a persuasive act to help the climate crisis, it isn't how we're going to get the change we need... not 100% clear to me that is his intention though.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 10:51 AM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
It does seem to me that there is a big gap between this utter minimalism, and wasteful mindless use of energy, where a sustainable and comfortable life is possible. My partner and I live in 101 unefficiently laid-out square metres, which is a lot (1087 square feet). In a climate where winter temps are -2 or -3 C at the lowest, and 31 or 32 C on the hottest summer days, we use around 6000kWh annually for heating and cooling and all our appliances. I think we can do better than that. And we generated around 5000kWh from our rooftop solar. It's not hard to imagine a future where rooftop solar is part of a standard build, dwellings are better laid out and insulated than our modernised but 1950s house, domestic and neighbourhood batteries help with timeshifting electricity demand, and so on.
On the personal responsibility front, it is FULLY valid to live in a way most consistent with your ethics, and from that standpoint, I applaud. As a persuasive act to help the climate crisis, it isn't how we're going to get the change we need... not 100% clear to me that is his intention though.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 10:51 AM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
It's endlessly baffling to me how people on the left rightly laugh at conservatives screeching about "personal responsibility" when attaching the poor, correctly recognizing that the causes of poverty are systemic, but whole-heartedly embrace it when it comes to the environment.
The left and right both exist to sustain and reinforce capitalism. It's just a messaging difference -- stuff like this is the perfect example "everything will be fine if you buy some stuff/change your habits/sacrifice, we don't need anything more radical than your personal allegiance to the cause". Unserious stuff.
posted by so fucking future at 10:57 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
The left and right both exist to sustain and reinforce capitalism. It's just a messaging difference -- stuff like this is the perfect example "everything will be fine if you buy some stuff/change your habits/sacrifice, we don't need anything more radical than your personal allegiance to the cause". Unserious stuff.
posted by so fucking future at 10:57 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Pumped storage exists right here in downtown Chicago -- the stored energy is used for HVAC, not electricity. If you've driven into downtown on the Eisenhower, you've passed the CenTrio Energy building, which chills water for HVAC systems during the nitetime (cheaper energy rates, less grid demand), then pumps the water throughout dpwntown buildings. (District energy if you want to learn more about this sort of system)
I had the chance to tour the building with my students (I teach a high school science class called "Energy") and it was remarkable, seeing enormous pipes that snaked out of the building and on throughout downtown. Jim, our tour guide (seen here chatting about the business on the evening news) said we were lucky we came through in March -- during the summer the building is a deafening roar.
Be mindful of personal usage, of course. I push that on my students. But I am frank with them: if you learn one thing in my class, it's the true magnitude of difference between effects of personal changes and corporate & policy changes on energy usage. The tour of CenTrio puts that front and center to them. Another effective demonstration is students estimating the amount of water they use while brushing their teeth, or taking a shower... and then we walk by the water meter for the nearby Walgreens (which is in the first floor of our building) and they see numbers at least 100x their usage. "But no one's using water in the Walgreens!!" That's the moment they "see" the resource usage for HVAC.
posted by Theophrastus Johnson at 11:08 AM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]
I had the chance to tour the building with my students (I teach a high school science class called "Energy") and it was remarkable, seeing enormous pipes that snaked out of the building and on throughout downtown. Jim, our tour guide (seen here chatting about the business on the evening news) said we were lucky we came through in March -- during the summer the building is a deafening roar.
Be mindful of personal usage, of course. I push that on my students. But I am frank with them: if you learn one thing in my class, it's the true magnitude of difference between effects of personal changes and corporate & policy changes on energy usage. The tour of CenTrio puts that front and center to them. Another effective demonstration is students estimating the amount of water they use while brushing their teeth, or taking a shower... and then we walk by the water meter for the nearby Walgreens (which is in the first floor of our building) and they see numbers at least 100x their usage. "But no one's using water in the Walgreens!!" That's the moment they "see" the resource usage for HVAC.
posted by Theophrastus Johnson at 11:08 AM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]
I had a vegan friend who claimed that vegans aren't at risk for food poisoning. I assume that if this is true, you could rely on a dark cool space like a closet to store your perishables.
This is definitely not true writ large! :) But yes, I'm having trouble thinking of significant ways to get inadvertently food-poisoned from storing pre-processed plant foods in suboptimal temperature.
posted by dusty potato at 11:16 AM on January 19, 2023
This is definitely not true writ large! :) But yes, I'm having trouble thinking of significant ways to get inadvertently food-poisoned from storing pre-processed plant foods in suboptimal temperature.
posted by dusty potato at 11:16 AM on January 19, 2023
Calling it "off-grid" is a bit of a stretch
Especially north of 14th St.
posted by condour75 at 11:17 AM on January 19, 2023 [10 favorites]
Especially north of 14th St.
posted by condour75 at 11:17 AM on January 19, 2023 [10 favorites]
This article puts the population density of ancient Rome at roughly 24,158/km2, and possibly as high as 31,700. (I wouldn't want to live there, though!)
Also, pre-conquest Tenochtitlan (Mexico City, also an island at the time) was probably around that density as well (though estimates of the population vary).
Fascinating! I realize my initial comment was skeptical but I was genuinely curious. It seemed to me that lacking the ability for upward growth (due to both the limitations of building materials and the limitations of material transport/modification) that this would be terribly unlikely. But I guess if you have nigh-supernatural concentrations of wealth and power most things are possible.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 11:25 AM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
Also, pre-conquest Tenochtitlan (Mexico City, also an island at the time) was probably around that density as well (though estimates of the population vary).
Fascinating! I realize my initial comment was skeptical but I was genuinely curious. It seemed to me that lacking the ability for upward growth (due to both the limitations of building materials and the limitations of material transport/modification) that this would be terribly unlikely. But I guess if you have nigh-supernatural concentrations of wealth and power most things are possible.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 11:25 AM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
Well, that, and have entire families a sleeping in the same room/bed, non-free people in conditions we wouldn't condone, dormitories for labourers, fewer private kitchens... Lots of differences that allow for higher density with other tradeoffs.
posted by sagc at 11:30 AM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by sagc at 11:30 AM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
But yes, I'm having trouble thinking of significant ways to get inadvertently food-poisoned from storing pre-processed plant foods in suboptimal temperature.
Bad things can happen to cooked rice.
posted by Comet Bug at 11:33 AM on January 19, 2023 [10 favorites]
Bad things can happen to cooked rice.
posted by Comet Bug at 11:33 AM on January 19, 2023 [10 favorites]
Wait, so you can just leave a bowl of say, cooked carrots out and just keep returning to it for a few days? My common sense says that's the road to gastrointestinal hell and that cooked food needs to be kept cool to stay safe.
posted by kingdead at 11:37 AM on January 19, 2023
posted by kingdead at 11:37 AM on January 19, 2023
Once we get the systems-level climate interventions that people claim to long for, the impact on people’s lives are going to be, if not quite this extreme, then at least further in this direction than we are now. We’ll drive less and have smaller cars. We’ll rely on public transport and certainly fly less. Houses will be smaller and denser. Meat consumption will decrease.
As long as people aren’t sanctimonious about it I see no problem in making those changes now if that is important to one’s values. This guy seems to take great pains to not draw any broader lessons from his experiment yet people are still pissed. For me, it’s interesting to read about the way he lives even if I have no intention of doing it myself.
I suspect those that are most angered by these kinds of articles are themselves engaging in individual behavior changes in support of the environment. For whatever reason they’ve decided their changes are justified while others’ are pointless. Or maybe it is just talking about it that’s the problem? The compromise may be that we all to do what we can, individually, but never ever mention it.
posted by scantee at 11:40 AM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
As long as people aren’t sanctimonious about it I see no problem in making those changes now if that is important to one’s values. This guy seems to take great pains to not draw any broader lessons from his experiment yet people are still pissed. For me, it’s interesting to read about the way he lives even if I have no intention of doing it myself.
I suspect those that are most angered by these kinds of articles are themselves engaging in individual behavior changes in support of the environment. For whatever reason they’ve decided their changes are justified while others’ are pointless. Or maybe it is just talking about it that’s the problem? The compromise may be that we all to do what we can, individually, but never ever mention it.
posted by scantee at 11:40 AM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
But yes, I'm having trouble thinking of significant ways to get inadvertently food-poisoned from storing pre-processed plant foods in suboptimal temperature.
Unrefrigerated hummus will absolutely kill you as will all cooked chickpeas within a surprisingly short time after letting them out of the can. Since hummus is a major food group for most of the vegans I know, I'm surprised anyone thought this.
Back to TFA, I lost interest when he admitted he was charging his phone and laptop at work. I don't know, I don't think weird little personal stunts like this get us anywhere at all. Maybe there are people out there who will now be more aware of small scale solar, and that's a good thing, but I'm just going to nth the whole, we need systemic change here, not one person turning off their refrigerator for 8 months.
posted by mygothlaundry at 11:44 AM on January 19, 2023 [6 favorites]
Unrefrigerated hummus will absolutely kill you as will all cooked chickpeas within a surprisingly short time after letting them out of the can. Since hummus is a major food group for most of the vegans I know, I'm surprised anyone thought this.
Back to TFA, I lost interest when he admitted he was charging his phone and laptop at work. I don't know, I don't think weird little personal stunts like this get us anywhere at all. Maybe there are people out there who will now be more aware of small scale solar, and that's a good thing, but I'm just going to nth the whole, we need systemic change here, not one person turning off their refrigerator for 8 months.
posted by mygothlaundry at 11:44 AM on January 19, 2023 [6 favorites]
Give me a simple system that can handle the "back" side of my home for much less money and let me go from there.
Just pretend it's a boat.
posted by nicwolff at 11:48 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Just pretend it's a boat.
posted by nicwolff at 11:48 AM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Beans can spoil just as dangerously as meat. You can even get E. Coli from beans and green vegetables.
That could be because workers don’t have access to toilet facilities or handwashing facilities. I Nth those asking about how he keeps 5 days worth of meals safe to eat without a refrigerator. Does he put the pot in the shade on the balcony? That’s how it was done in Bosnia. But 3 days MAX.
posted by Katjusa Roquette at 12:02 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
That could be because workers don’t have access to toilet facilities or handwashing facilities. I Nth those asking about how he keeps 5 days worth of meals safe to eat without a refrigerator. Does he put the pot in the shade on the balcony? That’s how it was done in Bosnia. But 3 days MAX.
posted by Katjusa Roquette at 12:02 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
But yes, I'm having trouble thinking of significant ways to get inadvertently food-poisoned from storing pre-processed plant foods in suboptimal temperature.
Cooked pasta that is poorly refrigerated can kill you with Bacillus cereus, lovely liver failure. And even for totally unprocessed foods, lettuce, spinach, green onions, sprouts have all been major food poisoning causes.
posted by tavella at 12:03 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
Cooked pasta that is poorly refrigerated can kill you with Bacillus cereus, lovely liver failure. And even for totally unprocessed foods, lettuce, spinach, green onions, sprouts have all been major food poisoning causes.
posted by tavella at 12:03 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
Well, that, and have entire families a sleeping in the same room/bed, non-free people in conditions we wouldn't condone, dormitories for labourers, fewer private kitchens... Lots of differences that allow for higher density with other tradeoffs.
Well, yeah, all things that can be pulled off when a few people have supernatural concentrations of wealth. We're almost there!
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 12:10 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
Well, yeah, all things that can be pulled off when a few people have supernatural concentrations of wealth. We're almost there!
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 12:10 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
I lost interest when he admitted he was charging his phone and laptop at work.
I truly don't know, but it's possible that it's more efficient to use "bulk" charging than individual home charging? Does undermine the whole "off the grid" claim, though.
But I guess if you have nigh-supernatural concentrations of wealth and power most things are possible.
All our population estimates from these periods are also just estimates. Nonetheless, unless you're planning to keep a significant proportion of the population as slaves or in slave-like conditions, not feasible without elevators. To go up. Look at the classically dense Lower East Side: even among the tenement buildings built otherwise in the most squalid and degrading possible forms, with shared toilets, cold-water kitchens, TB- and death-by-fire-friendly lack of ventilation (bedroom windows? who needs 'em!), and an expectation of cramming whole large immigrant families into three rooms, it's uncommon to see a six-floor building, and I don't know that I've ever seen a seven-floor walkup.
posted by praemunire at 12:12 PM on January 19, 2023
I truly don't know, but it's possible that it's more efficient to use "bulk" charging than individual home charging? Does undermine the whole "off the grid" claim, though.
But I guess if you have nigh-supernatural concentrations of wealth and power most things are possible.
All our population estimates from these periods are also just estimates. Nonetheless, unless you're planning to keep a significant proportion of the population as slaves or in slave-like conditions, not feasible without elevators. To go up. Look at the classically dense Lower East Side: even among the tenement buildings built otherwise in the most squalid and degrading possible forms, with shared toilets, cold-water kitchens, TB- and death-by-fire-friendly lack of ventilation (bedroom windows? who needs 'em!), and an expectation of cramming whole large immigrant families into three rooms, it's uncommon to see a six-floor building, and I don't know that I've ever seen a seven-floor walkup.
posted by praemunire at 12:12 PM on January 19, 2023
This article puts the population density of ancient Rome at roughly 24,158/km2, and possibly as high as 31,700. (I wouldn't want to live there, though!)
Also, pre-conquest Tenochtitlan (Mexico City, also an island at the time) was probably around that density as well (though estimates of the population vary).
Barcelona has an overall population density of about 16,000/km2, and some neighbourhoods (Eixample, which is geographically large in comparison to some other neighbourhoods) are twice as dense as that! In the many years that I lived in Barcelona, maybe a third of the people I knew lived in elevator buildings, and most of those had been installed in the last 30 years, at a guess. Our last flat there was a 6th floor walk up...100 stairs exactly. Wasn't fun with two toddlers, but we managed.
I didn't know many people with AC units either.
On a different note, I don't understand the hate directed at people trying to reduce their resource use. What's the problem? I don't think anyone apart from the carbon industry is trying to sell it as the solution to the climate problems. But if everyone used a little less, that's a little less pressure on all the systems, natural and man-made.
posted by conifer at 12:23 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Also, pre-conquest Tenochtitlan (Mexico City, also an island at the time) was probably around that density as well (though estimates of the population vary).
Barcelona has an overall population density of about 16,000/km2, and some neighbourhoods (Eixample, which is geographically large in comparison to some other neighbourhoods) are twice as dense as that! In the many years that I lived in Barcelona, maybe a third of the people I knew lived in elevator buildings, and most of those had been installed in the last 30 years, at a guess. Our last flat there was a 6th floor walk up...100 stairs exactly. Wasn't fun with two toddlers, but we managed.
I didn't know many people with AC units either.
On a different note, I don't understand the hate directed at people trying to reduce their resource use. What's the problem? I don't think anyone apart from the carbon industry is trying to sell it as the solution to the climate problems. But if everyone used a little less, that's a little less pressure on all the systems, natural and man-made.
posted by conifer at 12:23 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
I rent a house that gets a ridiculous amount of sun and has a huge sloped roof, plus an awning in back AND a huge vine-covered west-facing cement wall at the end of the lot (I back up on commercial property). I also have huge AC bills in the summer.
The landlords are definitely not the type to put any money for new amenities into the home (I worry about them selling it) so I looked into 'renter solar' a couple times during the pandemic and so far as I could tell it would take a very long time to recoup the investment required to put in any kind of temporary system vs. what it could run; and even then would not be able to take up that much of the grid load. (Whether looking at 120v for general use or 12v for lights and personal devices.)
I still like the idea though, and would be into having my lights and device chargers and etc off the grid it if it didn't amount to shooting myself in the foot money-wise, even without it being much of a savings.
If I could build a new fantasy home, separate 120v and 12v solar-powered circuits and appropriate battery storage would be a want.
I had a vegan friend who claimed that vegans aren't at risk for food poisoning
Botulism disagrees. Also, rice left too long.
posted by snuffleupagus at 12:28 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
The landlords are definitely not the type to put any money for new amenities into the home (I worry about them selling it) so I looked into 'renter solar' a couple times during the pandemic and so far as I could tell it would take a very long time to recoup the investment required to put in any kind of temporary system vs. what it could run; and even then would not be able to take up that much of the grid load. (Whether looking at 120v for general use or 12v for lights and personal devices.)
I still like the idea though, and would be into having my lights and device chargers and etc off the grid it if it didn't amount to shooting myself in the foot money-wise, even without it being much of a savings.
If I could build a new fantasy home, separate 120v and 12v solar-powered circuits and appropriate battery storage would be a want.
I had a vegan friend who claimed that vegans aren't at risk for food poisoning
Botulism disagrees. Also, rice left too long.
posted by snuffleupagus at 12:28 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
Going off-grid with limited panel surface area/battery requires a much lower energy budget when you use a chest freezer instead of a fridge-style cooler.
posted by meehawl at 12:33 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by meehawl at 12:33 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
A close friend lives without a fridge for over ten years now (in dense urban part of Vienna). He buys only organic and local produce, eats mostly vegetarian, and is a great cook, bakes his own bread, makes his own noodles, does a lot of canning / jarring of vegetables he buys in bulk. I have often eaten at his place and lived to tell the tale.
He does use a dark, cool cupboard for keeping cooked food. I noticed that he is very careful when reheating but otherwise
I can only assume that the quality of produce like greens etc here is simply better/less contaminated?
posted by 15L06 at 12:33 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
He does use a dark, cool cupboard for keeping cooked food. I noticed that he is very careful when reheating but otherwise
I can only assume that the quality of produce like greens etc here is simply better/less contaminated?
posted by 15L06 at 12:33 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
not feasible without elevators
posted by aniola at 12:36 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
If a person cannot self-evacuate or use the stairs, they should call 911 for help and be prepared to shelter in place. Sheltering in place may mean sheltering within an individual room with the door closed and using a wet towel to seal the cracks around the door. In some cases, people with limited mobility can get to the nearest exit stair. If it is clear or nearly clear of smoke, they can wait on the stair landing for assistance.Or, to put it bluntly:
How do people in wheelchairs safely exit a multi-level building during a fire evacuation if they can't use the elevator?I'm not a fan of high rise buildings.
I don’t know to be honest. I live in a 7 floor apartment building in Seattle. I’m disabled. I use a walker to get around. I have been told to stay in my apartment and fire department will come get you out. In the 3 years I have lived here there have been multiple building fire alarms. Not once did a fireman come get me. In fact one time I suffered smoke inhalation due to someone cooking stuff illegally on my floor. I figure I’ll die. I’ve gone to my stairwell and asked neighbors for help. Nope no help for me. I’m ignored. It’s not there responsibility. Basically we are the acceptable casualty for a building fire.
posted by aniola at 12:36 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
He buys only organic and local produce...bakes his own bread, makes his own noodles, does a lot of canning / jarring of vegetables...He does use a dark, cool cupboard for keeping cooked food. I noticed that he is very careful when reheating but otherwise...I can only assume that the quality of produce like greens etc here is simply better/less contaminated?
It's far more likely that it's the preservation and the careful reheating (killing the pathogens) that's responsible, not the socially-inflected perceived "quality" or 'purity' of the produce.
Refrigeration isn't that old, while needing to keep food to eat later is as old as it gets. And that kind of "contamination" has only improved under today's system. If anything, it's the 'organic' and 'artisanal,' 'farm-to-table' vendors that are going to sell you poopier produce.
And his bread is still going to go bad much much faster than a store bought loaf, and the faster the less perfect the conditions.
posted by snuffleupagus at 12:37 PM on January 19, 2023
It's far more likely that it's the preservation and the careful reheating (killing the pathogens) that's responsible, not the socially-inflected perceived "quality" or 'purity' of the produce.
Refrigeration isn't that old, while needing to keep food to eat later is as old as it gets. And that kind of "contamination" has only improved under today's system. If anything, it's the 'organic' and 'artisanal,' 'farm-to-table' vendors that are going to sell you poopier produce.
And his bread is still going to go bad much much faster than a store bought loaf, and the faster the less perfect the conditions.
posted by snuffleupagus at 12:37 PM on January 19, 2023
I mean, we could relearn how to live before electricity. Oil lamps. Ice boxes and root cellars. No Broadway shows for the entire summer. Horses instead of cars. Washing clothes by hand. Etc. But oil lamps were smelly, ice boxes required a weekly delivery, we like to vacation during the summer to see Broadway shows, horses were smelly too, and washing machines do a better job. Once we have a good thing, we need something better in order to give it up.
posted by Melismata at 12:44 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Melismata at 12:44 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Producing all stuff a household constantly uses up is also very time consuming, which is (part of) why this sort of thing has become a lifestyle signifier with class-marking implications. See the whole discussion around the cottagecore tradlife (and trad-wife) trend and its semiotics.
posted by snuffleupagus at 12:48 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by snuffleupagus at 12:48 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
I don't understand the hate directed at people trying to reduce their resource use. What's the problem?
The best I can figure, it's the output of people experiencing a conflict between what they believe they should do, and what they have the bandwidth to do at this time. Resentment and guilt.
Resentment, per the dictionary, is a feeling of indignant displeasure or persistent ill will at something regarded as a wrong, insult, or injury. So I imagine the resentment bit goes something like: "that would be hard for me, I want to continue to be a part of society, you're shifting the Overton window for what counts as normal" and the guilt part is, well, we've all heard about what happens to the planet if we don't make dramatic changes to the way we live.
posted by aniola at 12:49 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
The best I can figure, it's the output of people experiencing a conflict between what they believe they should do, and what they have the bandwidth to do at this time. Resentment and guilt.
Resentment, per the dictionary, is a feeling of indignant displeasure or persistent ill will at something regarded as a wrong, insult, or injury. So I imagine the resentment bit goes something like: "that would be hard for me, I want to continue to be a part of society, you're shifting the Overton window for what counts as normal" and the guilt part is, well, we've all heard about what happens to the planet if we don't make dramatic changes to the way we live.
posted by aniola at 12:49 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
There is so much easy stuff to do before going without electricity: insulation, passive design, efficient devices, smaller dwellings, blah blah. This is an experiment, not a model for life. It was very interesting to read, I'm not taking it as advocacy for how to live though.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 12:50 PM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 12:50 PM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]
I'm not a fan of high rise buildings.
If we're planning to maintain the same or higher population levels under basically decent living conditions without completely wrecking the planet, they are unavoidable. You don't need to be in a high rise to be trapped in a building if you can't negotiate stairs and no provision is made for your evacuation (which is the real problem here). You'd be just as trapped living in my last place, the third floor of a walk-up former townhouse with a stoop (too high to go out the window unassisted). It's a very important issue, but orthogonal.
Meanwhile, not to belabor the obvious, but elevators are necessary to make buildings of any kind of more than one story accessible at all for many.
posted by praemunire at 12:55 PM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
If we're planning to maintain the same or higher population levels under basically decent living conditions without completely wrecking the planet, they are unavoidable. You don't need to be in a high rise to be trapped in a building if you can't negotiate stairs and no provision is made for your evacuation (which is the real problem here). You'd be just as trapped living in my last place, the third floor of a walk-up former townhouse with a stoop (too high to go out the window unassisted). It's a very important issue, but orthogonal.
Meanwhile, not to belabor the obvious, but elevators are necessary to make buildings of any kind of more than one story accessible at all for many.
posted by praemunire at 12:55 PM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
In a European city or town it's certainly possible to live without a fridge and I have — but then your fridge is your local market/shop/delivery truck. I personally wouldn't call it 'off-grid'.
But living off-grid being sustainable or earth friendly ... Is it? I've got a lot of solar/wind on the grid. Why would I spend resources on my own solar panels and batteries? We've built all this power infrastructure and now we should throw it away? It seems wasteful, in Manhattan or any other city.
posted by UN at 1:03 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
But living off-grid being sustainable or earth friendly ... Is it? I've got a lot of solar/wind on the grid. Why would I spend resources on my own solar panels and batteries? We've built all this power infrastructure and now we should throw it away? It seems wasteful, in Manhattan or any other city.
posted by UN at 1:03 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
The article was fascinating, but this thread has made me frightened of leftovers.
posted by JanetLand at 1:09 PM on January 19, 2023 [20 favorites]
posted by JanetLand at 1:09 PM on January 19, 2023 [20 favorites]
It seemed to me that lacking the ability for upward growth (due to both the limitations of building materials and the limitations of material transport/modification) that this would be terribly unlikely.
Upward growth isn't really necessary if you limit the space for cars and parking. Compare the amount of space lost for a suburban neighborhood street at 50 feet wide, vs that space for homes with a 15 foot wide street. This guy calls it hypertrophic street design, and it's been common in the US since the 1850s.
posted by The_Vegetables at 1:30 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Upward growth isn't really necessary if you limit the space for cars and parking. Compare the amount of space lost for a suburban neighborhood street at 50 feet wide, vs that space for homes with a 15 foot wide street. This guy calls it hypertrophic street design, and it's been common in the US since the 1850s.
posted by The_Vegetables at 1:30 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Niagara Falls is another hydro battery. They "turn down" the falls at night to do it. At night, water is diverted from the Niagara river above the falls to fill reservoirs. By day, the river water flows over the falls in all its impressive glory, and water in the reservoirs is used to power generators on its way down to outlets below the falls.
posted by evilmomlady at 1:31 PM on January 19, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by evilmomlady at 1:31 PM on January 19, 2023 [5 favorites]
If he cooks his five portions of stew in separate quart or pint mason jars inside his pressure cooker at 15 psi with bands and lids in place, but without the bands tightened down, and then tightens the bands down as soon as the pressure drops enough to get access, he could wait a lot longer than a week to eat his stew.
But that would require much more faith in having perfect technique than I would be able to muster.
Beans raw in the store actually contain living nitrogen fixing bacteria. That seems to be the point of all those lectins; they bind to the glycocalyx of the bacteria and keep them under control until it’s time to multiply and take their place in the root nodules.
Normally those bacteria are a special class called rhizobia, but Clostridia, which include include botulism, tetanus, and gangrene bacteria, are also nitrogen fixing soil bacteria, and I’ve often wondered whether the surprising number of cases of botulism attributed to poorly cooked beans is due to living Clostridia getting swept into the beans themselves.
But I’ve never seen anything in print that points to such a possibility.
posted by jamjam at 1:50 PM on January 19, 2023 [5 favorites]
But that would require much more faith in having perfect technique than I would be able to muster.
Beans raw in the store actually contain living nitrogen fixing bacteria. That seems to be the point of all those lectins; they bind to the glycocalyx of the bacteria and keep them under control until it’s time to multiply and take their place in the root nodules.
Normally those bacteria are a special class called rhizobia, but Clostridia, which include include botulism, tetanus, and gangrene bacteria, are also nitrogen fixing soil bacteria, and I’ve often wondered whether the surprising number of cases of botulism attributed to poorly cooked beans is due to living Clostridia getting swept into the beans themselves.
But I’ve never seen anything in print that points to such a possibility.
posted by jamjam at 1:50 PM on January 19, 2023 [5 favorites]
If we're planning to maintain the same or higher population levels under basically decent living conditions without completely wrecking the planet, they are unavoidable.
I've heard this before and I'm not convinced one way or the other. I feel like if we were working with the environment instead of against it, we could support basically decent living conditions without high rises, but I don't have much to support that. Is there a study that argues your point, and defines what it means by basically decent living conditions? Because it doesn't sound right to me, either.
posted by aniola at 1:52 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
I've heard this before and I'm not convinced one way or the other. I feel like if we were working with the environment instead of against it, we could support basically decent living conditions without high rises, but I don't have much to support that. Is there a study that argues your point, and defines what it means by basically decent living conditions? Because it doesn't sound right to me, either.
posted by aniola at 1:52 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Sometimes individuals making changes forces systemic change. Australian home owners with roof top solar have forced a reckoning where it's not really economical to have coal fired plants, which are closing earlier than anticipated.
Of course, sometimes systemic change is needed. The collapse of REDcycle, a soft plastics recycling company, illustrates that.
posted by freethefeet at 2:02 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
Of course, sometimes systemic change is needed. The collapse of REDcycle, a soft plastics recycling company, illustrates that.
posted by freethefeet at 2:02 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
I have no objection to people who do various types of - let's call them 'sabbaths' - to raise their own awareness of their consumptive habits and dependencies. Meatless Mondays, Sober Octobers, etc.
So if people want to pick one week a year when they go to the utility closet and shut off the electricity, great. More (less) power to 'em!
But I wouldn't call running an extension cord from the neighbors, or going downstairs to the corner convenience store to get your ice cream, living an 'off grid life'.
posted by bartleby at 2:15 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
So if people want to pick one week a year when they go to the utility closet and shut off the electricity, great. More (less) power to 'em!
But I wouldn't call running an extension cord from the neighbors, or going downstairs to the corner convenience store to get your ice cream, living an 'off grid life'.
posted by bartleby at 2:15 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Picking modernities that you only use a shared version of, not private provision, is a really interesting middle path!
For some things it’s more efficient — some processes scale well.
For some things it’s a gate on how much you really want it. Living with a car share was like that IME; enough hassle to reduce my driving, not enough to remove trips I needed or even really wanted.
Sometimes it changes the way you enjoy things - bars, restaurants, coffeehouses, live concerts, dance floors, gyms, schools, it might be better with other people.
And sometimes it’s probably wasteful of energy or labor, because some things don’t scale well.
posted by clew at 3:36 PM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
For some things it’s more efficient — some processes scale well.
For some things it’s a gate on how much you really want it. Living with a car share was like that IME; enough hassle to reduce my driving, not enough to remove trips I needed or even really wanted.
Sometimes it changes the way you enjoy things - bars, restaurants, coffeehouses, live concerts, dance floors, gyms, schools, it might be better with other people.
And sometimes it’s probably wasteful of energy or labor, because some things don’t scale well.
posted by clew at 3:36 PM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
On a different note, I don't understand the hate directed at people trying to reduce their resource use. What's the problem? I don't think anyone apart from the carbon industry is trying to sell it as the solution to the climate problems
Yeah I thought this article was pretty straightforward about "this is what I wanted to try, and this is how it went for me" without being self righteous, but a lot of people react to people doing things like cycling, veganism, and going off-grid as if it's somehow an indictment of their own lives if they themselves are not doing those things.
posted by oneirodynia at 4:08 PM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
Yeah I thought this article was pretty straightforward about "this is what I wanted to try, and this is how it went for me" without being self righteous, but a lot of people react to people doing things like cycling, veganism, and going off-grid as if it's somehow an indictment of their own lives if they themselves are not doing those things.
posted by oneirodynia at 4:08 PM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
If he cooks his five portions of stew in separate quart or pint mason jars inside his pressure cooker
Instant pot goes out of their way to stress that the units are not pressure canners.
posted by soelo at 4:25 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
Instant pot goes out of their way to stress that the units are not pressure canners.
posted by soelo at 4:25 PM on January 19, 2023 [2 favorites]
The author's first section "why would I do this" covers the systemic vs personal pretty well. And "inspiration to others" needn't mean inspiring others to make personal changes! As he writes, he hopes to inspire leaders to think about the issues. There can be a ton of value in doing things that get people thinking about what's possible.
We added solar panels, and later a geothermal system, at our home because we could, and it feels good to do it. My partner, a born educator, posts on social media to a mostly local following about the installation process, how the systems work, what our results are. We don't expect to inspire anyone to install systems at their homes (though it has happened). Mostly it's educating people on the possibilities, so when the village starts talking about installing a solar farm and the local "experts" say it can never work here because clouds, systemic change is too expensive, he can talk about our experience. And people know him, and listen, and ask good questions.
A lot of people didn't know what geothermal is - there's a lot to it, why would they bother studying it? But some bite -sized posts with photos and people are actually curious
and ask good questions. And now a few more people around here know about another way we can heat buildings. Maybe even government buildings, and factories. It's education. It all helps.
posted by evilmomlady at 4:31 PM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
We added solar panels, and later a geothermal system, at our home because we could, and it feels good to do it. My partner, a born educator, posts on social media to a mostly local following about the installation process, how the systems work, what our results are. We don't expect to inspire anyone to install systems at their homes (though it has happened). Mostly it's educating people on the possibilities, so when the village starts talking about installing a solar farm and the local "experts" say it can never work here because clouds, systemic change is too expensive, he can talk about our experience. And people know him, and listen, and ask good questions.
A lot of people didn't know what geothermal is - there's a lot to it, why would they bother studying it? But some bite -sized posts with photos and people are actually curious
and ask good questions. And now a few more people around here know about another way we can heat buildings. Maybe even government buildings, and factories. It's education. It all helps.
posted by evilmomlady at 4:31 PM on January 19, 2023 [4 favorites]
decent living conditions
For me, decent living conditions include a population dense enough that I have access to adequate public transportation and I don’t need to own a car. I’ve only experienced that in cities.
WRTFA: Early in the pandemic I started turning all the power off in my apartment for one hour a day. I forgot to keep doing it after a week or so, and I never looked into the difference in my electric bill, but in my actual experience nothing changed. Nothing went bad in my fridge, none of my devices went uncharged, at worst I had to run the dishwasher a little later.
How many of us would have to take on a daily hour without electricity - a non-power hour if you will - to counter the effects of the least-wasteful corporation?
posted by bendy at 4:40 PM on January 19, 2023
For me, decent living conditions include a population dense enough that I have access to adequate public transportation and I don’t need to own a car. I’ve only experienced that in cities.
WRTFA: Early in the pandemic I started turning all the power off in my apartment for one hour a day. I forgot to keep doing it after a week or so, and I never looked into the difference in my electric bill, but in my actual experience nothing changed. Nothing went bad in my fridge, none of my devices went uncharged, at worst I had to run the dishwasher a little later.
How many of us would have to take on a daily hour without electricity - a non-power hour if you will - to counter the effects of the least-wasteful corporation?
posted by bendy at 4:40 PM on January 19, 2023
Ok one more comment, quoting from the article:
With Kitty Hawk, the (Wright) brothers showed the world what was possible. You could argue that they failed, as their plane couldn’t transport other people or cargo, it wasn’t safe, and it couldn’t go far. And they didn’t create an airport, let alone a global network.
You could say their individual action didn’t matter and that only governments and corporations could act on the necessary scale. (And large-scale energy changes will indeed need to come from the top.) But the Wrights shifted the world’s mindset... They unleashed others to act, leading to then-unimaginable results. And that’s what I hope to see.
posted by evilmomlady at 4:43 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
With Kitty Hawk, the (Wright) brothers showed the world what was possible. You could argue that they failed, as their plane couldn’t transport other people or cargo, it wasn’t safe, and it couldn’t go far. And they didn’t create an airport, let alone a global network.
You could say their individual action didn’t matter and that only governments and corporations could act on the necessary scale. (And large-scale energy changes will indeed need to come from the top.) But the Wrights shifted the world’s mindset... They unleashed others to act, leading to then-unimaginable results. And that’s what I hope to see.
posted by evilmomlady at 4:43 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
I don't think there is actually a lot of hate, but let's be honest here: his experiment was harmless, but otherwise pretty much dumb. He proved that someone who is surrounded by grid-sourced resources (like central building heating, corner stores, charging things at work) can choose to live more "minimally" as long as they are willing to heavily rely on those surrounding resources. I'm not seeing a more general lesson here.
There are great off-grid and low-consumption experiments and lifestyles, but this isn't one of them.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:08 PM on January 19, 2023
There are great off-grid and low-consumption experiments and lifestyles, but this isn't one of them.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:08 PM on January 19, 2023
Of all the substantive stuff I want to discuss in this. I have to first digress.
Pressure canning your food can make it shelf stable for years if it is acidic or salty enough and kept at the pressure temp level for the proper time. There is active controversey about whether various brands of electric pressure cookers actually can do this (are guaranteed to do this). And inventing your own reciepes/proportions is a use at your own risk affair.
Greens, even washed greens from fields or food systems exposed to manuere can bring pathogens. Washing rarely solves this, cooking does as does irradiation of food. If you didnt grow it, you should trust it, cook it.
Worked an organic farm, run a homestead. Without refridgeration, even tender greens can last 6 weeks at room temp, unwashed eggs 2 months. In dry climate bread and chips don't need refridgeration. Raw carrots beets cabbages can last months with minimal hydration (once a week spritze) but must get cooked before eating. Some people insist on refridgerating butter, tomatoes or ultrapastuerized milk, others eat fridays pizza of the table on sunday.
Food and disease - a land of contrasts.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:01 PM on January 19, 2023 [6 favorites]
Pressure canning your food can make it shelf stable for years if it is acidic or salty enough and kept at the pressure temp level for the proper time. There is active controversey about whether various brands of electric pressure cookers actually can do this (are guaranteed to do this). And inventing your own reciepes/proportions is a use at your own risk affair.
Greens, even washed greens from fields or food systems exposed to manuere can bring pathogens. Washing rarely solves this, cooking does as does irradiation of food. If you didnt grow it, you should trust it, cook it.
Worked an organic farm, run a homestead. Without refridgeration, even tender greens can last 6 weeks at room temp, unwashed eggs 2 months. In dry climate bread and chips don't need refridgeration. Raw carrots beets cabbages can last months with minimal hydration (once a week spritze) but must get cooked before eating. Some people insist on refridgerating butter, tomatoes or ultrapastuerized milk, others eat fridays pizza of the table on sunday.
Food and disease - a land of contrasts.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:01 PM on January 19, 2023 [6 favorites]
Now to the real stuff.
If the example of 6 billion people now, and many billions of people in the past living materially less intensive lives than the above average american (some of those billions are happy, some heroic, some unremarkable, some terrible)... if those billions are not enough of an example to convince the devastating top 500 million hyperconsumers not to murder-suicide the ecosphere... then maybe this dude isn't likely to. Then again after so many indigenious people discovered everything, we still somehow give credit to Columbus, Cook and Magellan Eminem and Macklemore, maybe its not persuasive until a certified Blanco does it?
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:08 PM on January 19, 2023
If the example of 6 billion people now, and many billions of people in the past living materially less intensive lives than the above average american (some of those billions are happy, some heroic, some unremarkable, some terrible)... if those billions are not enough of an example to convince the devastating top 500 million hyperconsumers not to murder-suicide the ecosphere... then maybe this dude isn't likely to. Then again after so many indigenious people discovered everything, we still somehow give credit to Columbus, Cook and Magellan Eminem and Macklemore, maybe its not persuasive until a certified Blanco does it?
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:08 PM on January 19, 2023
2 real, 2 furious:
"the poisonous yet pervasive idea that society-level or general infrastructure-level issues can or even should be a matter of individual personal responsibility.
100% agree, society and governance is exactly the things that don't work as individualism. And only some people voluntarily abstaining from poisoning their neighbors (air, water, soil, future) is like having only half the town shit in the well.
The sooner we kill that idea, the sooner we can get real change instead of stunts like this.
Uh, nope. This idea isn't an accident, it is a tactic of an organized, self-interested antisocial class of psychopaths that command hierarchical institutions of education, surveilance, violence, imprisonment, propoganda, currency, laws and use marketing, political ideology, religious cultural racial sexual identify to murdernthe societies and individuals that stand in the way of running up their scores. True when the invaders from the west asian subcontinent "discovered/genocided" the americas, true when we liberated Iraq etc.
Neither personal abstention nor democratic politics nor vanguard rebellion nor violent leaderless resistance nor corrupt dicatorship nor one party communist states nor nor nor have managed to dethrone the megamachine that turns a living world into money and ashes.
Have fun storming the castle.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:21 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
"the poisonous yet pervasive idea that society-level or general infrastructure-level issues can or even should be a matter of individual personal responsibility.
100% agree, society and governance is exactly the things that don't work as individualism. And only some people voluntarily abstaining from poisoning their neighbors (air, water, soil, future) is like having only half the town shit in the well.
The sooner we kill that idea, the sooner we can get real change instead of stunts like this.
Uh, nope. This idea isn't an accident, it is a tactic of an organized, self-interested antisocial class of psychopaths that command hierarchical institutions of education, surveilance, violence, imprisonment, propoganda, currency, laws and use marketing, political ideology, religious cultural racial sexual identify to murdernthe societies and individuals that stand in the way of running up their scores. True when the invaders from the west asian subcontinent "discovered/genocided" the americas, true when we liberated Iraq etc.
Neither personal abstention nor democratic politics nor vanguard rebellion nor violent leaderless resistance nor corrupt dicatorship nor one party communist states nor nor nor have managed to dethrone the megamachine that turns a living world into money and ashes.
Have fun storming the castle.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:21 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
And lastly. People talk about the public resistance to lifestyle change as if the (non-rich) public is choosing between the life have now or imagine they might get if business as usual continues compare to the less fun life they get if they "go green" or whatever.
But this cicilization is finished either way. You lose your car, your hamburger, your thermostat to "Green New Dealers" with their buses, tofu and sweaters (oh the horror) or you lose it to the Business as usual bank fraud, road rage, oil wars, climate famine, thiel panopticon housing crisis fire tornados.
Except for the next 30 years at least, you get both Because the ship on the extinction and climate and habitat crises has a lot of momentum and lag and has sailed pretty far already. We are saving our grandchildren not because it won't get bad until then, but because it can't get back to good until then.
Our emissions are above RCP 8.5 we are on the 4-6C pathway, the curvature of feedback is happening now. The methane signals is in the atmosphere.
Charging your vegan phone at your Goldman Sachs cubicle is worth at least two re-useable straws!
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:32 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
But this cicilization is finished either way. You lose your car, your hamburger, your thermostat to "Green New Dealers" with their buses, tofu and sweaters (oh the horror) or you lose it to the Business as usual bank fraud, road rage, oil wars, climate famine, thiel panopticon housing crisis fire tornados.
Except for the next 30 years at least, you get both Because the ship on the extinction and climate and habitat crises has a lot of momentum and lag and has sailed pretty far already. We are saving our grandchildren not because it won't get bad until then, but because it can't get back to good until then.
Our emissions are above RCP 8.5 we are on the 4-6C pathway, the curvature of feedback is happening now. The methane signals is in the atmosphere.
Charging your vegan phone at your Goldman Sachs cubicle is worth at least two re-useable straws!
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:32 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
I feel like if we were working with the environment instead of against it, we could support basically decent living conditions without high rises, but I don't have much to support that. Is there a study that argues your point, and defines what it means by basically decent living conditions? Because it doesn't sound right to me, either.
Why not? If we're keeping the same population (and allowing for it to continue to grow), the alternative is to spread everyone out at a lower density. Which requires constant inefficient transport of all needed goods, which makes it extremely difficult to rely on public transit rather than inefficient private vehicles, which requires the inefficient provision of decentralized essential services. This is not very controversial. It's just physics. I'm not really aware of anyone serious/without obvious vested interests in the present setup who thinks (working within the constraints of current technology, of course) we can avoid ever-increasing density if we're to modulate energy consumption. Which means, among things, high rises.
Aesthetically, my current high-rise is inferior to my old sliver of chopped-up townhouse in every way except the view. And I get the heebie-jeebies thinking about a fire on a lower floor, even though this is a modern "fireproof" building. But we are, as I understand it, ~ several hundred thousand units short of housing in NYC, and you aren't going to build your way out of that with some ten-unit townhouses, you know?
posted by praemunire at 10:35 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
Why not? If we're keeping the same population (and allowing for it to continue to grow), the alternative is to spread everyone out at a lower density. Which requires constant inefficient transport of all needed goods, which makes it extremely difficult to rely on public transit rather than inefficient private vehicles, which requires the inefficient provision of decentralized essential services. This is not very controversial. It's just physics. I'm not really aware of anyone serious/without obvious vested interests in the present setup who thinks (working within the constraints of current technology, of course) we can avoid ever-increasing density if we're to modulate energy consumption. Which means, among things, high rises.
Aesthetically, my current high-rise is inferior to my old sliver of chopped-up townhouse in every way except the view. And I get the heebie-jeebies thinking about a fire on a lower floor, even though this is a modern "fireproof" building. But we are, as I understand it, ~ several hundred thousand units short of housing in NYC, and you aren't going to build your way out of that with some ten-unit townhouses, you know?
posted by praemunire at 10:35 PM on January 19, 2023 [3 favorites]
If you housed all 10 billion people giving every man woman and child their own 2000 square feet of home/office space, then the State of Montana (150,000 sq miles) would be 5 floors tall and contain the entire worlds population.
If we put the elderly and those with difficulty using stairs among the 2 billion people on the first floor, then we could safely go elevator free.
20 trillion square feet / 5 floors / sqft per square mile.
Ok, i really must go to bed, destroy my phone.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:47 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
If we put the elderly and those with difficulty using stairs among the 2 billion people on the first floor, then we could safely go elevator free.
20 trillion square feet / 5 floors / sqft per square mile.
Ok, i really must go to bed, destroy my phone.
posted by anecdotal_grand_theory at 10:47 PM on January 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
Late to the party -- it's exam week.
But there are things here I know about.
First of all, high-rise buildings are not necessary for sustainable high density. The example of Barcelona above is perfect. Barcelona (as many other European cities) is dense enough to provide extensive public transportation, short enough distances for biking or walking and an efficient infrastructure for all the necessary provisions. High rises are mostly built using steel and concrete, both huge sources of CO2. We should limit their use, and specially the use of concrete, considerably. This is all well documented, and has been for so long that it might mainly be in old-fashioned books and journals. This is a recent newspaper article.
During the last couple of decades, there has been a huge boom in tall buildings, mostly built for speculative purposes. The reasons are a lot of interests cross-contaminating: the building industry (in many countries a white-washing industry for the mob), ultra-rich people having nowhere else to put their investments, because of the low interest rates and slump in productivity, cities using repurposing of public lands for speculative building as their main source of income... It goes on. But there is something like a global lobby continuously promoting high rise buildings as sustainable solutions against better knowledge.
Obviously, some places like Singapore, Manhattan and Hong Kong have limited options for expansion, but for most normal cities, density is better achieved with more sustainable buildings and plans.
I've mentioned before that in the early 00s, there was a plan to make the densest section of Copenhagen into a zero carbon neighborhood. All buildings would be refitted so they had zero heat loss, solar panels would be installed on all roofs, people would be helped to replace their cars with electrical vehicles, so the surplus energy could be stored in car batteries. Windmills on the sea would provide electricity when there was no sun. For the inhabitants, there would be no extra costs: instead of paying their usual bills, they would use the same amount of money to pay off a huge collective loan. After 20 or 30 years, there would be nearly free energy (there would still be maintenance costs, obvs.) I don't know exactly why it didn't happen, and the boss of the energy company was fired. I suspect fowl play. But I often think how not only Copenhagen, but the whole world would be in a different place today if it had happened, because of the R&D involved, that could be adapted everywhere.
BTW, an aspect of high rise cities that has only recently been understood is their effect on biodiversity. Areas with many high rises have an inhospitable climate, with warmer summers and colder winters than the surrounding landscape, so they are often almost dead areas, when it comes to insects and plants. Whereas medium rise areas can have the opposite effect, if properly managed, because they protect plant life and are insect friendly.
Solar is great for cities. It should be mandated that all new and renovated buildings should have solar panels installed.
I like the article and the experiment, and I didn't read it as placing the responsibility for change on individuals. It is just a small proof of concept experiment that will have a different result at a larger scale. We need to change a lot of things in order to save ourselves, and we also need to explore that change creatively. I am absolutely against the argument that we need to give up comfort and joy, because I believe we need to find different comforts and joys. 150 years ago, a fine equipage was a sign of wealth and joyful living. It needed stables and grooms and a whole infrastructure for removing waste. Now it is a niche interest, and not one pursued in Manhattan. 50 years ago, a wealthy person might have loved his fast car, and pay a lot for its garage and the fuel. He would not miss the horses and carriage his granddad owned, he had a different form of pleasure. Today, the gangsters on my street drive Teslas, and don't miss the gas guzzlers they paraded a decade ago. 50 years from now, everything will be different again, in ways we can't imagine. But it will only be worse than now if we don't act now, and "we" won't act now, if majorities in many country see acting as deprivation and vote for the fascists.
posted by mumimor at 4:16 AM on January 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
But there are things here I know about.
First of all, high-rise buildings are not necessary for sustainable high density. The example of Barcelona above is perfect. Barcelona (as many other European cities) is dense enough to provide extensive public transportation, short enough distances for biking or walking and an efficient infrastructure for all the necessary provisions. High rises are mostly built using steel and concrete, both huge sources of CO2. We should limit their use, and specially the use of concrete, considerably. This is all well documented, and has been for so long that it might mainly be in old-fashioned books and journals. This is a recent newspaper article.
During the last couple of decades, there has been a huge boom in tall buildings, mostly built for speculative purposes. The reasons are a lot of interests cross-contaminating: the building industry (in many countries a white-washing industry for the mob), ultra-rich people having nowhere else to put their investments, because of the low interest rates and slump in productivity, cities using repurposing of public lands for speculative building as their main source of income... It goes on. But there is something like a global lobby continuously promoting high rise buildings as sustainable solutions against better knowledge.
Obviously, some places like Singapore, Manhattan and Hong Kong have limited options for expansion, but for most normal cities, density is better achieved with more sustainable buildings and plans.
I've mentioned before that in the early 00s, there was a plan to make the densest section of Copenhagen into a zero carbon neighborhood. All buildings would be refitted so they had zero heat loss, solar panels would be installed on all roofs, people would be helped to replace their cars with electrical vehicles, so the surplus energy could be stored in car batteries. Windmills on the sea would provide electricity when there was no sun. For the inhabitants, there would be no extra costs: instead of paying their usual bills, they would use the same amount of money to pay off a huge collective loan. After 20 or 30 years, there would be nearly free energy (there would still be maintenance costs, obvs.) I don't know exactly why it didn't happen, and the boss of the energy company was fired. I suspect fowl play. But I often think how not only Copenhagen, but the whole world would be in a different place today if it had happened, because of the R&D involved, that could be adapted everywhere.
BTW, an aspect of high rise cities that has only recently been understood is their effect on biodiversity. Areas with many high rises have an inhospitable climate, with warmer summers and colder winters than the surrounding landscape, so they are often almost dead areas, when it comes to insects and plants. Whereas medium rise areas can have the opposite effect, if properly managed, because they protect plant life and are insect friendly.
Solar is great for cities. It should be mandated that all new and renovated buildings should have solar panels installed.
I like the article and the experiment, and I didn't read it as placing the responsibility for change on individuals. It is just a small proof of concept experiment that will have a different result at a larger scale. We need to change a lot of things in order to save ourselves, and we also need to explore that change creatively. I am absolutely against the argument that we need to give up comfort and joy, because I believe we need to find different comforts and joys. 150 years ago, a fine equipage was a sign of wealth and joyful living. It needed stables and grooms and a whole infrastructure for removing waste. Now it is a niche interest, and not one pursued in Manhattan. 50 years ago, a wealthy person might have loved his fast car, and pay a lot for its garage and the fuel. He would not miss the horses and carriage his granddad owned, he had a different form of pleasure. Today, the gangsters on my street drive Teslas, and don't miss the gas guzzlers they paraded a decade ago. 50 years from now, everything will be different again, in ways we can't imagine. But it will only be worse than now if we don't act now, and "we" won't act now, if majorities in many country see acting as deprivation and vote for the fascists.
posted by mumimor at 4:16 AM on January 20, 2023 [5 favorites]
I do think meat could be largely phased out, primarily via high taxes on meat products, but also wealth-externalities taxes on shares in meat service companies. We're destroying the Amazon largely for meat, which then turns South America becomes mostly desert. Also thanks for the Plant Based Treaty linke.
As jellywerker it, Nate Hagens interviewed low-tech magazine and no tech magazine editor Kris De Decker: “Low Tech: What, Why and How”
posted by jeffburdges at 7:08 AM on January 20, 2023
As jellywerker it, Nate Hagens interviewed low-tech magazine and no tech magazine editor Kris De Decker: “Low Tech: What, Why and How”
posted by jeffburdges at 7:08 AM on January 20, 2023
People's individual decisions matter, though the main thing the author did was give up flying, mentioned briefly. Most people use plane travel for casual recreation, frequently. Many people have absurdly large and inefficient cars. Many people have absurdly large and inefficient homes. But of course we need to reverse corporate greed and wealth aggregation, especially in the US, where the wealthy have so successfully owned the government, but, really, everywhere, because it's all global. The fossil fuel industry is wildly successful at controlling the narrative, esp. in the corrupt GOP, who actively push fossil fuel and prohibit solar and wind.
The messaging that only corporate responsibility matters is harmful, because individuals have to make personal changes and have to push corporate changes. Project Drawdown has a bunch of feasible solutions. Paul Hawken thinks like a successful business person.
posted by theora55 at 8:16 AM on January 20, 2023
The messaging that only corporate responsibility matters is harmful, because individuals have to make personal changes and have to push corporate changes. Project Drawdown has a bunch of feasible solutions. Paul Hawken thinks like a successful business person.
posted by theora55 at 8:16 AM on January 20, 2023
Bad things can happen to cooked rice.
Don't even get me started on potatoes.
posted by waving at 8:24 AM on January 20, 2023
Don't even get me started on potatoes.
posted by waving at 8:24 AM on January 20, 2023
Here's another article about how high-density low-rise cities are more sustainable than skyscrapers.
posted by Gerald Bostock at 10:25 AM on January 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Gerald Bostock at 10:25 AM on January 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Thanks Gerald Bostock! That article will be useful for me, when teaching first semester engineers.
A whole other thing is that I strongly believe that the tide is changing re.: urban growth. People have been moving from rural areas to cities and suburbs for the last 200 years, perhaps with a very small backlash during the seventies. But I think that is about to change. The data isn't there yet, and maybe what I am noticing is just a seventies-style bleep, but now I'm just telling you what I feel.
Why should you believe me? I'm allergic to trends, like Cayce, or Cassandra. But I know that isn't an argument.
That said, COVID has changed peoples' perception of urban life, and created the impetus towards working from home that trend-people expected to happen twenty years ago. My internet is actually better at our farm than in the city, because the network is overloaded in the city, so my zoom meetings work just fine from a remote rural area and not at all from the center of our capital city.
Artists are moving out of cities because they can't afford studio space. Richard Florida overdid his "creative class" argument by including almost everyone with an education in the creative class. But he was right in the observation that creatives are first movers in the process of gentrification, and right now, they are moving out.
And that changes our perception. When I was a kid, the only place to be was in the suburbs. Then when I was a teenager, the inner city was cool. Now my adult children hardly ever visit the city, and prefer the semi urban industrial ring, with the youngest being evermore interested in farmland. She's not there yet, but she is rural-curious.
EVs may be a game changer when it comes to rural infrastructure. We don't know yet because they are still expensive, battery range is not there, and rare minerals are just another environmental issue. Right now I worry about retiring at the farm, because I need a fairly solid vehicle to get there and out again for shopping during winter and I feel bad about my diesel car. But that may be solved within the next decade.
One of the things my youngest is hesitant about is acces to culture. But during the holidays we talked about how our village already has several bars and restaurants, a yearly cabaret, a tiny museum and lots of famous people stopping by for concerts because they "feel" the change. There is an international jazz festival in the next village over. Maybe in a few years' time there will be even more of a cultural scene.
posted by mumimor at 11:09 AM on January 20, 2023
A whole other thing is that I strongly believe that the tide is changing re.: urban growth. People have been moving from rural areas to cities and suburbs for the last 200 years, perhaps with a very small backlash during the seventies. But I think that is about to change. The data isn't there yet, and maybe what I am noticing is just a seventies-style bleep, but now I'm just telling you what I feel.
Why should you believe me? I'm allergic to trends, like Cayce, or Cassandra. But I know that isn't an argument.
That said, COVID has changed peoples' perception of urban life, and created the impetus towards working from home that trend-people expected to happen twenty years ago. My internet is actually better at our farm than in the city, because the network is overloaded in the city, so my zoom meetings work just fine from a remote rural area and not at all from the center of our capital city.
Artists are moving out of cities because they can't afford studio space. Richard Florida overdid his "creative class" argument by including almost everyone with an education in the creative class. But he was right in the observation that creatives are first movers in the process of gentrification, and right now, they are moving out.
And that changes our perception. When I was a kid, the only place to be was in the suburbs. Then when I was a teenager, the inner city was cool. Now my adult children hardly ever visit the city, and prefer the semi urban industrial ring, with the youngest being evermore interested in farmland. She's not there yet, but she is rural-curious.
EVs may be a game changer when it comes to rural infrastructure. We don't know yet because they are still expensive, battery range is not there, and rare minerals are just another environmental issue. Right now I worry about retiring at the farm, because I need a fairly solid vehicle to get there and out again for shopping during winter and I feel bad about my diesel car. But that may be solved within the next decade.
One of the things my youngest is hesitant about is acces to culture. But during the holidays we talked about how our village already has several bars and restaurants, a yearly cabaret, a tiny museum and lots of famous people stopping by for concerts because they "feel" the change. There is an international jazz festival in the next village over. Maybe in a few years' time there will be even more of a cultural scene.
posted by mumimor at 11:09 AM on January 20, 2023
I don't know if you can do much to increase the density of Manhattan without building high rises but surely you could significantly increase the density of the other boroughs by building to 6 or 8 storeys there. Outside of NYC I'd wager that every large city in the US and Canada could easily increase their population by double or more by replacing all their low buildings and houses with 6 storey buildings and with that level of density public transit in those areas would become much more viable. In my city, Toronto, there's a really small core of high rises in the centre of downtown and then the high rises pretty much make a thin line above the subway, but really thin, like one building on each side of the road and behind those back to detached houses. We have semi-detached houses 500m away from city hall.
Why should you believe me? I'm allergic to trends, like Cayce, or Cassandra. But I know that isn't an argument.
Nice Gibson reference!
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:47 PM on January 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
Why should you believe me? I'm allergic to trends, like Cayce, or Cassandra. But I know that isn't an argument.
Nice Gibson reference!
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:47 PM on January 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
Is there a study that argues your point, and defines what it means by basically decent living conditions? Because it doesn't sound right to me....
This is mild sea-lioning, likely not intended; but where's the study validating your doubts and requiring rebuttal?
posted by snuffleupagus at 12:49 PM on January 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
This is mild sea-lioning, likely not intended; but where's the study validating your doubts and requiring rebuttal?
posted by snuffleupagus at 12:49 PM on January 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
I don't know if you can do much to increase the density of Manhattan without building high rises but surely you could significantly increase the density of the other boroughs by building to 6 or 8 storeys there.
Yes. The New York metro area is actually fairly low density on average (i.e., miles and miles of sprawling single family houses, on increasingly large lots as you move outwards) but with a very dense center. Some other cities maintain higher average densities without having the ultra-dense center, for example.
There's been a lot of really interesting 3-D mapping of density in recent years -- here's an example comparing a number of very large cities globally.
Broadly speaking, density is going to be more "sustainable" in terms of inputs required per person, but not necessarily "sustainable" in terms of human happiness (as in the discussion above of ancient Rome). But it's average density, not peak density, that is really the key.
posted by Dip Flash at 1:16 PM on January 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Yes. The New York metro area is actually fairly low density on average (i.e., miles and miles of sprawling single family houses, on increasingly large lots as you move outwards) but with a very dense center. Some other cities maintain higher average densities without having the ultra-dense center, for example.
There's been a lot of really interesting 3-D mapping of density in recent years -- here's an example comparing a number of very large cities globally.
Broadly speaking, density is going to be more "sustainable" in terms of inputs required per person, but not necessarily "sustainable" in terms of human happiness (as in the discussion above of ancient Rome). But it's average density, not peak density, that is really the key.
posted by Dip Flash at 1:16 PM on January 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Most of the largest cities in Europe are not dominated by hi-rises. Tall buildings are typically corporate peacocks and residential hi-rises are pretty rare and exclusive. Not to say that density isn’t good. It is! But Berlin and Paris for example (I have less experience with other large European cities) achieve high density with 6 story buildings arranged properly.
posted by sjswitzer at 2:34 PM on January 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by sjswitzer at 2:34 PM on January 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Kyoto is able to be pretty dense with strong controls over building height in order to preserve sightlines. They do it primarily with lots of small houses close to each other and some low apartment buildings. I found the place pretty livable. Hell I'd be living there now if I could.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 2:59 PM on January 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 2:59 PM on January 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Japan in an interesting case, with the contrast between places like Kyoto and Tokyo. And then the sleepy little villages you hear about with what seem like impossibly cheap, very cute little houses being offered for very low prices to keep them from falling into disrepair.
posted by snuffleupagus at 3:52 PM on January 20, 2023
posted by snuffleupagus at 3:52 PM on January 20, 2023
This is mild sea-lioning, likely not intended; but where's the study validating your doubts and requiring rebuttal?
I wasn't aware that I had to support every comment in which I admit to not knowing everything already with a study to support my doubts. No, sealioning wasn't intended. I thought I made it pretty clear that I didn't have any support for either side, it was just something that I thought was important to talk about more. If you don't think it's important to talk about it, then please don't. That's sound advice no matter the intent. But I'm really glad for the informed bits of the conversation that came out of my request for further discussion.
As a social learner, I would personally like to see more room for people to ask honest "stupid questions" around here, and my question was actually founded in years of paying attention to urban planning and related fields.
posted by aniola at 6:55 PM on January 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
I wasn't aware that I had to support every comment in which I admit to not knowing everything already with a study to support my doubts. No, sealioning wasn't intended. I thought I made it pretty clear that I didn't have any support for either side, it was just something that I thought was important to talk about more. If you don't think it's important to talk about it, then please don't. That's sound advice no matter the intent. But I'm really glad for the informed bits of the conversation that came out of my request for further discussion.
As a social learner, I would personally like to see more room for people to ask honest "stupid questions" around here, and my question was actually founded in years of paying attention to urban planning and related fields.
posted by aniola at 6:55 PM on January 20, 2023 [3 favorites]
I wasn't aware that I had to support every comment in which I admit to not knowing everything already with a study to support my doubts.
Did this somehow get fused with the irony thread? You're the one who asked someone to justify their comments in a vibes-based thread on somebody's hipsterish bloggable lifestyle experiment with studies: "Is there a study that argues your point, and defines what it means by basically decent living conditions?"
Thus my comment.
posted by snuffleupagus at 7:30 PM on January 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
Did this somehow get fused with the irony thread? You're the one who asked someone to justify their comments in a vibes-based thread on somebody's hipsterish bloggable lifestyle experiment with studies: "Is there a study that argues your point, and defines what it means by basically decent living conditions?"
Thus my comment.
posted by snuffleupagus at 7:30 PM on January 20, 2023 [1 favorite]
I think what's going on here is a bog standard ask vs. guess culture misunderstanding.
posted by aniola at 7:54 PM on January 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by aniola at 7:54 PM on January 20, 2023 [2 favorites]
Quite possibly; I'm pretty Guess.
posted by snuffleupagus at 8:12 PM on January 20, 2023
posted by snuffleupagus at 8:12 PM on January 20, 2023
There’s another recent article which I’d rebrand as ‘climate refuges from capitalism’, (Climate Quitters, at Bloomberg) which is another virtuous direction to take in response to our current crisis. Like an alternative universe or the opposite of when the ‘quants’ went to Wall Street instead of using their mathematical prowess for non-imaginary systems that improve income disparity instead of widening it. While I’m underwhelmed by the tone and content of this post considering I usually give Ars the benefit of the doubt, publish or perish amirite.
I’m reminded of a significantly more ambitious project there was a documentary/book about ~15 years ago called No Impact Man, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1280011/
… the cult of personality is a powerful drug (and that title!), but I really liked its ambition and how the story was spun by the filmmakers. For this particular article, having lived in Manhattan practically surrounded by NYU , I’m predisposed to be judgmental of younger people who seem to have not found resources or did…research before experimenting and penning a missive on the topic (yay first-principles simpletons!) but it’s still effort in a purportedly genuine and worthy direction, so I’ll get over myself. More please! Be clumsy in public! 2023, less caremad!
posted by allisterb at 6:25 AM on January 22, 2023
I’m reminded of a significantly more ambitious project there was a documentary/book about ~15 years ago called No Impact Man, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1280011/
… the cult of personality is a powerful drug (and that title!), but I really liked its ambition and how the story was spun by the filmmakers. For this particular article, having lived in Manhattan practically surrounded by NYU , I’m predisposed to be judgmental of younger people who seem to have not found resources or did…research before experimenting and penning a missive on the topic (yay first-principles simpletons!) but it’s still effort in a purportedly genuine and worthy direction, so I’ll get over myself. More please! Be clumsy in public! 2023, less caremad!
posted by allisterb at 6:25 AM on January 22, 2023
Stew’s ready! Spodek has arranged a flight of his apple kombuchas and beet and orange chutneys (peels included), which are pleasantly zingy. For dessert, how about some slightly past-their-prime blackberries? Everything will taste not so bad and cause only moderate digestive complications.
posted by The corpse in the library at 7:11 PM on January 27, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by The corpse in the library at 7:11 PM on January 27, 2023 [1 favorite]
Estimated cost of Canadian Coastal GasLink pipeline surges to $14.5-billion
posted by jeffburdges at 3:29 PM on February 2, 2023
posted by jeffburdges at 3:29 PM on February 2, 2023
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I had no idea that this kind of portable small-scale setup existed, and it's giving me ideas. Like, "I'm seriously going to shoot this link to my roommate" ideas. We don't have access to the roof, but we do have limited access to the back yard - at least enough to set up a rig like this for a couple hours once a week. It wouldn't be enough to go totally off-grid, but it might make a dent in things.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:20 AM on January 19, 2023 [8 favorites]