Fear and Loathing, a Rat Flu Odyssey

[old goat]

Can we try to at least salvage one good thing from this pandemic? If so, how about working from home, at least half of the time? As a country, we have talked a lot about global warming and reducing emissions. Not having to heat and keep the lights on in all the office buildings and then reducing how much everyone drives for commuting to work would sure seem to be a boon for the environment...no?

Instead of our leaders coming out in support of reduced commuting and energy use, they are starting campaigns to encourage workers back to their offices to save the economies of their cities. Surely the left leaning city population and leaders sees the contradiction in this...no?

https://kdvr.com/news/coronavirus/wo...ually-want-to/

Biden needs to start a campaign to encourage work from home arrangements as part of his environmental initiatives. It just make too much sense. Also, American's putting the money spent on commuting and work day lunches could be saved or funneled into more durable goods that are better for the environment.

The skeptic in me thinks it will all go back to how it was before....but this sure seems like a great opportunity for this generation of leaders.

The very right wing CEO of Washington Media (whatever that it) wants her employees back in the office and threatens to [illegally] reclassify WFHers as contractors without benefits, and to [illegally] get rid of her older employees who prefer to work from home. I suppose she could just order everyone back and fire everyone who refuses so I suppose the workers should be grateful.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...g-work-office/

[old_newguy]

I was trying to focus on energy expenditures in the name of environmental impact.


Weird. All the recreation we do there is within 20 miles, most within 6. Or just walk out of town.

In any case, it's not reasonable to paint with a broad brush or to invoke comparisons with Bangkok whose inhabitants have little functional similarity with your average tech bro or folks who commute 70 miles a day.

I’m talking remote rural E Oregon population center. IE John Day, Baker City, La Grande.

I ended up driving, a lot. Short commute to work, but wouldn’t think twice about a 20-30 mile drive to a fishing hole after work in the summer, etc.

I do think there is worth in thinking about shifting away from a dense urban core to a more dispersed WFH model. It has potentially bad impacts on overall energy consumption, land development, etc. Especially when we are trying to move toward a less carbon intensive future. Maybe rural WFH is better, I don’t know.

[gretch6364]

The very right wing CEO of Washington Media (whatever that it) wants her employees back in the office and threatens to [illegally] reclassify WFHers as contractors without benefits, and to [illegally] get rid of her older employees who prefer to work from home. I suppose she could just order everyone back and fire everyone who refuses so I suppose the workers should be grateful.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...g-work-office/

I brought up political leanings due to most political leadership in major cities being left leaning, which SHOULD in theory align them with environmental groups, global warming, etc. and it is an interesting thought practice since tax revenues for major cities would suffer from continued long term WFH.

It will be fun to watch what is more important to the political leaders of major urban areas. The environment, or tax revenues. I am going to place my bet on tax revenues.

Either way...I am all for less commuting. I think it is wasteful...so either find a way to encourage people to live closer to urban cores and increase density...or promote WFH. Pick a side...and the pandemic had a negative effect on progress made toward increased density.

[Buster Highmen]

I’m talking remote rural E Oregon population center. IE John Day, Baker City, La Grande.

I ended up driving, a lot. Short commute to work, but wouldn’t think twice about a 20-30 mile drive to a fishing hole after work in the summer, etc.

I do think there is worth in thinking about shifting away from a dense urban core to a more dispersed WFH model. It has potentially bad impacts on overall energy consumption, land development, etc. Especially when we are trying to move toward a less carbon intensive future. Maybe rural WFH is better, I don’t know.

I think I've demonstrated how rural living reduces energy usage, at least for us.

Last year, the WFH dealio greatly reduced our mileage here in the Puget Sound outskirts.

The funny thing is that, in the urban context, it's the energy consumptive commuter traffic that dissuades us from that 20 to 30 mile post work recreational objective drive.

While they're not the Grande Ronde, the Stillaguamishes, Sky and Snoqualmie can be worthy. Living relatively rurally, the Snoq is a 6 mile drive from here.

Fortunately, the road with the heavy traffic from the right and light traffic from the left that I used to use is not en route.

[old_newguy]

I think I've demonstrated how it reduces energy usage, at least for us. Last year, the WFH dealio greatly reduced our mileage.

The funny thing is that, in the urban context, it's the energy consumptive commuter traffic that dissuades us from that 20 to 30 mile post work recreational objective drive.

While they're not the Grande Ronde, the Stillaguamishes, Sky and Snoqualmie can be worthy. Living relatively rurally, the Snoq is a 6 mile drive from here.

Fortunately, the road with the heavy traffic from the right and light traffic from the left that I used to use is not en route.

I’m sure we can both come up with how our current situation reduces energy consumption via reduced commuting rural or otherwise. I’m more interested in the aggregate and how a move from multi family, dense living to more dispersed “rural” or suburban WFH living would pencil out on the net energy consumption considering all inputs.

I don’t have enough data to make a judgement one way or the other, but my gut tells me it isn’t obvious.

[LongShortLong]

Well, that's quite a generalization. Have some data to back that up? How large the house? How much electricity being used? Heated pool? Heated garage? Heated driveway? A house in a cold climate and/or hot climate?

Then, what kind of vehicle? Truck, or Tesla? How often and how many miles are the vehicles driven? For what purpose?

DOE likely has an exact number, or set of numbers. Probably for representative specific examples as well.

The basic argument says an average residence runs on about a kW for 24 hours, or 24kWh. Burning 4 gal gas/day commuting is gonna run you 4 x 1.3 * 10^8 J * (1kWh / 3.6 * 10^6 J) = 144 kWh. Six times in this example. Many nits to pick if you like, but transportation burns a shitload of energy.

YMMV

[Buster Highmen]

I’m sure we can both come up with how our current situation reduces energy consumption via reduced commuting rural or otherwise.

Fortunately, I feel no need for snide remarks in order to invalidate others experience.

[old_newguy]

Fortunately, I feel no need for snide remarks in order to invalidate others experience.

Not intended to be snide. Apologies if it came across that way.

[gretch6364]

I am not claiming our lifestyle is realistic for everyone, but just ran into town and we have driven 1,150 miles since January 13th. Almost 100% for skiing, fishing and food.

Now, we do drive a lot more in the summer and we have to go to Denver in June, but surely WFH is better for the environment for a lot of office employees.


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[Benny Profane]

DOE likely has an exact number, or set of numbers. Probably for representative specific examples as well.

The basic argument says an average residence runs on about a kW for 24 hours, or 24kWh. Burning 4 gal gas/day commuting is gonna run you 4 x 1.3 * 10^8 J * (1kWh / 3.6 * 10^6 J) = 144 kWh. Six times in this example. Many nits to pick if you like, but transportation burns a shitload of energy.

Especially if it's a giant pickup truck to whole foods.

[dunfree]

Building a whole bunch of work from home offices doesn’t seem terribly efficient, but the exercise mostly seems to be people justifying their utterly inefficient Rural lifestyle with urban earnings.

[old_newguy]

I am not claiming our lifestyle is realistic for everyone, but just ran into town and we have driven 1,150 miles since January 13th. Almost 100% for skiing, fishing and food.

Now, we do drive a lot more in the summer and we have to go to Denver in June, but surely WFH is better for the environment for a lot of office employees.


Sent from my iPhone using TGR Forums

Fuel consumption is obviously less. Not having the existing rural or suburban worker commute 30 miles in traffic to an office is a an obvious benefit on the fuel consumption side.

But I’m certainly not convinced that moving or incentivizing a bunch of people to move out of denser urban living into less dense, larger homes to accommodate WFH is a net gain over decades. Which is going to happen and appears to be happening as people realize they don’t have to be in the City.

[LongShortLong]

Especially if it's a giant pickup truck to whole foods.

Aye. Better to send the amazon truck on one trip to 20 houses than 20 pickup trucks to whole foods.

[east or bust]

With regard to energy consumption for skiing, let's say some metroskisusal induhvidual who commutes about 300 miles per week has an approximately 180 mile round trip to his favorite and very hip ski locale.

If they go 20 times a year over a 4 month period, that's 16x300 + 20x180 == 4800 + 3600 == 8400 miles of driving.

Whereas the evil, subsidized ruralists may drive 100 miles per week for supplies, generally WFH or have a short commute and drive 20 miles round trip to their little ski area 20 times a year. Throw in another 2000 miles of driving just to bias things.

So that's 16x100 + 20x20 + 2000 == 1600 + 400 + 2000 == 4000.

Other things being equal (housing, schools, etc) I never understand the rural versus urban claims with regard to fossil fuel dependent Americans who ski or leave their urban perfection to recreate.

Where do plane trips to second homes in the mtns factor into this equation?

[Buster Highmen]

DOE likely has an exact number, or set of numbers. Probably for representative specific examples as well.

The basic argument says an average residence runs on about a kW for 24 hours, or 24kWh. Burning 4 gal gas/day commuting is gonna run you 4 x 1.3 * 10^8 J * (1kWh / 3.6 * 10^6 J) = 144 kWh. Six times in this example. Many nits to pick if you like, but transportation burns a shitload of energy.

YMMV

This is a reasonable place to start: that transportation burns more energy than housing.
For us, living in a rural area where recreation was closer resulted in less driving.

If I insinuated that had to be the case for everyone, I didn't mean to.

It does however eviscerate the argument that rural living is less energy efficient for each case.

I grant that overall, it may be that rural life in America does invoke less overall energy efficiency. But that is as a result of inadequate efficient transportation or just more driving.

Take Yurp for example. Its covered with thousands of small rural villages, many more than one finds per hectare in the States. But their public transit blows away the US public transit. And their energy use per capita is much less than the US, even though they are on a similar latitude and climate.

So it boils down to transportation, not rural versus urban. If being in an urban area incites more driving as it does for us and many similarly minded tech bros and yuppies, then that's the issue.

[Buster Highmen]

Where do plane trips to second homes in the mtns factor into this equation?

I don't know.
Generally though, another unpopular data point is that for long trips, planes are more efficient than cars with less than 4 passengers.
In the example, we don't fly, we drive.

[altasnob]

Take Yurp for example. Its covered with thousands of small rural villages, many more than one finds per hectare in the States. But their public transit blows away the US public transit. And their energy use per capita is much less than the US, even though they are on a similar latitude and climate.

But Europe has much more dense housing than in the US, regardless of whether you compare cities or rural villages. Paris is more dense than NYC. And this is true for old, medieval cities and villages as well as in post-war Germany (so its not just an age thing). Europe also has much stronger urban growth boundaries than in the US (urban growth boundaries apply to both large cities, and small towns). 30 years from now, Teton Valley is not going to look like a dense, medieval French village. It will be a sprawling mess of McMansions on cul-de-sacs dotted with the occasional Costco and Walmart.

I am a West coast guy, but I understand NE USA is more like Europe, with lots of small, but dense, towns. This is probably the most efficient place in the US to live and it is not surprising it is also the most European-like, and oldest, part of the US. It also has climate similar to Europe compared to the arid West.

[Buster Highmen]

To iterate, it boils down to transportation, not rural versus urban. If being in an urban area incites more driving as it does for us and many similarly minded tech bros and yuppies, then that's the issue.

[altasnob]

Mass transit is already USA is already the least efficient on earth (as ranked by public dollar spent versus revenue received back from fares). Dense places like Hong Kong and Singapore top that list. I would agree that if the USA could somehow build a Europe like transportation system rural and urban would become more dense. But we don't have the money to do so. It is cost effective to build transit in places that are already dense, and will become denser after that transit is built. Look at the astronomical costs of building lightrail from Everett to Tacoma, an area that, as the US goes, is already pretty dense. The Honolulu rail project is a major boondogle, and that is in one of the most dense urban areas in America. I am not against transit (the opposite, for it). But it is a pipe dream to think we can somehow build transit through the spread out, rural, Western USA.

[wooley12]

We didn't have the money to build the Erie Canal or go to the moon but we had leaders with the vision of the future to do it. "We don't have the money" is bullshit with a full stop.

[jono]

How so? Seems to be plenty of people paying a shit ton of money for houses these days.

Rising prices indicate reduced supply, no? They certainly reflect that where I live.

The fear of sprawl has been self-defeating where density is concerned. 5-acre minimums and such are neat for a minute in one place and then that place moves. NIMBYs.

[east or bust]

We didn't have the money to build the Erie Canal or go to the moon but we had leaders with the vision of the future to do it. "We don't have the money" is bullshit with a full stop.

Look at me, actually agreeing with wooley for once. BS is right. With the right drivers behind the wheel and ample forethought there’s no reason we couldn’t develop a high speed rail system, not just in the west, but across the entire country.

[wooley12]

Look at me, actually agreeing with wooley for once. BS is right. With the right drivers behind the wheel and ample forethought there’s no reason we couldn’t develop a high speed rail system, not just in the west, but across the entire country.

My dad used to tell me I was smarter than I looked.

[Benny Profane]

Look at me, actually agreeing with wooley for once. BS is right. With the right drivers behind the wheel and ample forethought there’s no reason we couldn’t develop a high speed rail system, not just in the west, but across the entire country.

Would get bogged down in eminent domain lawsuits. Take our only "high speed" line, the Acela. To make it actually high speed would mean seisure of maybe trillions of dollars worth of private land. Ain't gonna happen.

[AdironRider]

How many of you are actually willing to use public transportation post COVID?

I don’t think a single person here, the relatively affluent, outdoor pursuit loving dentists, is in any shape or form that makes a difference.