West Coast Fires

[Recording Engineer]

Well wait, you did first put in Newsom’s name specifically before taking it out and opening it up to CA’s long-game direction overall. I’m guessing the later is used when conversing with a more reasonable balanced group and the former to the more pumped-up conservative group.

 

[iturnknobs]

My comment still stands that those in charge  do not wish to disturb the land over environmental concerns.  This is not new. Proper land management is necessary regardless of who owns it.

...so you propose ignoring environmental concerns while enabling profit by ignoring even more environmental concerns? I see the problem... and I watched some of the Nevada superspreader event, also.

 

[JohnRoberts]

It seems more like an individual governments issue and how well they enforce their fire-prevention regulations and ordinances.

In part...

My brother living in SoCal has strict local regulations about brush (fuel) clearance, with significant fines for not managing such hazards  on his property. The more rural wooded areas are probably not that simple.

This not a new debate in the NW but probably some creative new deflections.

JR

 

[Recording Engineer]

Yes definitely not as simple and only in part, but that comment alone is definitely much much more than the crap our president and his media support is spewing because people will and do, chew it up.

 

[pucho812]

Well wait, you did first put in Newsom’s name specifically before taking it out and opening it up to CA’s long-game direction overall. I’m guessing the later is used when conversing with a more reasonable balanced group and the former to the more pumped-up conservative group.

I never took it out. What I said was it is just more reason to recall Gavin newsom.

 

[pucho812]

...so you propose ignoring environmental concerns while enabling profit by ignoring even more environmental concerns? I see the problem... and I watched some of the Nevada superspreader event, also.

NO. What I said was those who run the show do not wish to land manage over environmental concerns. I never once suggested enabling profit over this. Clearly with all the fires we have a problem. Clearly there are ways to  help elevate the problem.  Clearly no one has done anything about it on a mass scale.  The amount of damage in the last several years has been astronomical. Entire towns are gone. Clearly there is a simple solution but for whatever reason it is being ignored.

 

[crazydoc]

In general, western U.S. forests were fundamentally changed in the 1800 and 1900s from previous centuries. The increased burning of the 1800s and the subsequent widespread exclusion of fire altered stand structure and composition, understory vegetation and fuel loads, and facilitated entry of nonnative species (76). Coupled with timber extraction and land clearance, the consequences for western forests were dramatic.

...

Since the mid 1800s, the trend in fire activity has strongly diverged from the trend predicted by climate alone and current levels of fire activity are clearly out of equilibrium with contemporary climate conditions. The divergence in fire and climate since the mid 1800s CE has created a fire deficit in the West that is jointly attributable to human activities and climate change and unsustainable given the current trajectory of climate change.

https://www.pnas.org/content/109/9/E535

 

[crazydoc]

Clearly there is a simple solution but for whatever reason it is being ignored.

That's right - burn, baby, burn.

 

[Recording Engineer]

I get it It’s easy to blame the party you don’t support, it’s easy to blame the one guy.  But at the end of it, he has had nothing to do with how California has continually made bad choices over the last two decades.

I thought you were referring to Newsom. Were you instead referring to Trump? I don’t understand anyone who supports Newsom’s recall and not Trump’s impeachment. Reason plays no role I guess. Support the team at all cost.

For the record, Newsom is way too far left for my comfort, but should he go any higher, he’ll be up against others far too right for my comfort. Trump should be considered far too Trump for anyone’s comfort.

 

[Matador]

California has refused to do any sort of land management for years now.

Can you explain to me exactly how California is mismanaging federally managed lands?

 

[pucho812]

Can you explain to me exactly how California is mismanaging federally managed lands?

Can you explain to me what land management California has done on a mass  scale with land they own?

 

[JohnRoberts]

Maybe we can assess blame after we get the fires put out...

It seems that if we don't change what we are doing in the future, we will keep getting what we are getting.

Be safe everybody out there.

JR

 

[FarisElek]

Can someone tell me how land management has anything to do with the highest temperatures ever recorded basically ever year for the last few years? Just askin.

 

[pucho812]

Can someone tell me how land management has anything to highest temperatures ever recorded basically ever year for the last few years? Just askin.

Sure, can’t burn dead growth if it’s not there

 

[L´Andratté]

Yeah, but what if both "sides" (lol) are right, too much growth (too little normal small wildfires in the past)
AND climate change (the added warmth of maybe two degree is not recognizable, but still adds strongly to the desiccation process of plant material)?

So sorry this is a solely about who´s right or wrong, a "culture-war" with adults on all sides acting like three y.o., so only one can be right. Right?

And fun question for climate change deniers: are the wildfires in Amazon rainforest or Siberian tundra as well as Australia last winter (and next?) also caused solely by bad forest management?

 

[pucho812]

Yeah, but what if both "sides" (lol) are right, too much growth (too little normal small wildfires in the past)
AND climate change (the added warmth of maybe two degree is not recognizable, but still adds strongly to the desiccation process of plant material)?

So sorry this is a solely about who´s right or wrong, a "culture-war" with adults on all sides acting like three y.o., so only one can be right. Right?

And fun question for climate change deniers: are the wildfires in Amazon rainforest or Siberian tundra as well as Australia last winter (and next?) also caused solely by bad forest management?

all good points.

 

[scott2000]

+1

Too bad we can't have some type of rain water collection pipeline system that directs excess water to areas that need it.... We've had so much rain over the last couple of months it's ridiculous....

doesn't really address the forest stuff but could still be useful in some way maybe....?

 

[JohnRoberts]

Yeah, but what if both "sides" (lol) are right, too much growth (too little normal small wildfires in the past)
AND climate change (the added warmth of maybe two degree is not recognizable, but still adds strongly to the desiccation process of plant material)?

The earth's temperature is an objective fact so not a subject for debate... What is worth some "slow thinking" (thoughtful consideration), is the whole man made carbon driven climate change thesis, and need to cancel all fossil fuels.

This is a classic fast thinking/slow thinking flawed assumption where we anchor on one objective truth (temperature is changing) and suspend critical thinking to accept a paired conclusion that we are guilty of causing this change (not so objective).

And...  even if we accept the man made warming thesis, atmospheric carbon is a very slow moving phenomenon so even the experts admit that cutting carbon emissions to zero will not make a measurable change for maybe a century or centuries if we don't also stop cow farts, and breathing (we release CO2). 

So sorry this is a solely about who´s right or wrong, a "culture-war" with adults on all sides acting like three y.o., so only one can be right. Right?

And fun question for climate change deniers: are the wildfires in Amazon rainforest or Siberian tundra as well as Australia last winter (and next?) also caused solely by bad forest management?

OK my fun question for the climate change true believers, "what is the proper temperature for our planet?" We could actively cool or heat the planet, if/when useful but where do we set the thermostat?
===
I admit I have not been playing much attention to Siberia, The Amazon rainforest has been clearly mismanaged by commercial interests  (clear cutting for farmland etc.). The VP of Brazil recently addressed the issue.

But Mr. Bolsonaro’s vice president, Hamilton Mourão, struck a decidedly different tone in an interview with The Wall Street Journal this week. He offered a rare mea culpa and said that the government hadn’t directed enough resources and attention to reducing deforestation, which has skyrocketed in the past two years as land grabbers and wildcat ranchers have moved deeper into the world’s largest rainforest.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/brazils-vice-president-admits-mistakes-in-fighting-amazon-deforestation-11599211803

Sadly the climate change initiatives looks like a naked political power grab, calling climate change (that has always happened) as the next scary existential threat, to base massive wealth transfer and funding a new international bureaucracy, to manage spending all the captured wealth.  I suspect the 3rd world residents still living in poverty, would benefit far more from cheap energy than a few random solar panels.

Just like temperature is an objective fact, there is no debate that elevated temperatures are contributing to the intensity and frequency of widespread wildfires, but is not the root cause. Rather than rant about climate change (never let a crisis go to waste) that can not be impacted in our (my) lifetime, maybe look at more aggressive forest management that can be implemented almost immediately (after we put out the fires).

JR

 

[crazydoc]

No worries regarding future fires.

POTUS Pants-on-fire, "It’ll start getting cooler. You just watch.” 

Wade Crowfoot,  “I wish science agreed with you.”

P P-o-F, “OK, well, I don’t think science knows, actually.”

 

[crazydoc]

Rather than rant about climate change (never let a crisis go to waste) that can not be impacted in our (my) lifetime, maybe look at more aggressive forest management that can be implemented almost immediately (after we put out the fires).

Good luck with that - I don't think private citizens or corporations are going to pay for it (unless they're on the receiving end of huge lawsuits like PG&E.)