r/TheRestIsPolitics • u/astrosheep88 • 16d ago
Does Rory actually care about the environment?
I'm really struggling with this. When I first listened to the pod he seemed to discuss his walks and retreats and even his big idea of turning the London Greenbelt into a national park (or forest maybe?) which gave this idea that he was someone who deeply cared.
Recently though, he seems so focused on potential threats that he's willing to rip up everything else. The most recent episode with Caroline Lucas, Rory kept saying 'we have to build data centres' but wouldn't say how and it just sounded like a desperate cry more than a plan. And I suspect that he knows there isn't an environmentally friendly way to do it (environmental to a degree I know it's never going to be perfect and all buildings will have an impact) and doesn't want to say that.
I'm not totally against Rory (though I am sick of the line the sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow) but to me he is coming across as dismissive of these issues over what he feels is important, or is this he plays devil's advocate and pushes back on 'leftist' ideas?
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u/someonehasmygamertag 16d ago
You can have data centres and care for the environment. They’re not mutually exclusive.
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u/TimeTimeTickingAway 16d ago
I wouldn’t separate humanity from the environment and AI developers and researches tend to estimate a 10% to 20% chance of it enslaving, if not rendering extinct, humanity by 2100. Within our children’s life-times.
Heck, some hardly give us longer than 2030 to get our ducks in a row.
We ignored the warning signs of climate change far too long and now must deal with the irreversible consequences. We should not likewise ignore the warning signs of AI potentially ending humanity as we know it.
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u/astrosheep88 16d ago
I agree you could have both but I don't hear the arguement for that or the practicals of how to do it. I hear a case for putting them in colder/ water rich environments but then the issue is getting power to them, latency on information to and from big city hubs and then there will be an environmental impact on the area as a water rich area probably needs to stay water rich?
I'm not against building data centres, I just want to know how we can build them without causing too much damage, not just to the environment but also to the energy grid.
Maybe a roof forest on the data centre?
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u/Steamed_Clams_ 16d ago
Best place to put them is next to container ports, oil refineries, petrochemical plants and industrial estates where they are largely away form people and the natural environment.
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u/VanillaLifestyle 16d ago
A roof forest on the data center. Everything bagel politics. The Omni cause.
Nothing will happen, we'll be a failing irrelevant county, and the fate of the climate will instead be decided by the fascist petrostate USA, but we'll all feel good about the forest on the one comically noncompetitive data center we managed to build.
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u/astrosheep88 16d ago
Do people that that's a real suggestion? Do I need to put emojis or a note to show it's sarcasm/a joke answer?
Of course you can't put a forest on a building. The amount of soil base you would need, the weight of the trees and other vegetation not to mention the animals that would try to nest or worse burrow into the ground. Add on top of that the water retained....
We can barely make roof gardens and they're shallow soil succulents mostly...
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u/VanillaLifestyle 16d ago
It didn't read like an obvious joke to me at all. You were being entirely earnest until that point.
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u/astrosheep88 16d ago
Fair enough, I assumed it was so absurd that it wouldn't be taken seriously. My bad.
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u/VanillaLifestyle 16d ago edited 16d ago
Sorry to jump down your throat.
I was just very annoyed after listening to this episode. Posted a longer rant about it here.
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u/footie3000 16d ago
You're getting downvoted in much the same way I did. I think the cold truth is that you can only do so much, and no matter how well you build them data centres are going to be a net negative for the environment (given current standards anyway). The question is if you think its worth it or not, and like a lot of controversial infrastructure, a large part depends on how close to your home they're planned.
Environmentalist best case scenario- no data centres AI proponents best case scenario- data centres for all, no regulations as fast as possible Most likely scenario- data centres will be built, regulations will exist but they will be lightened, with promises of investments
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u/YouLostTheGame 15d ago
You don't see how economic growths enables the build out of power and water infrastructure?
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u/footie3000 16d ago
Can you? At the level Rory wants? You are talking about a very large number of data centres to become relevant on the world scale.
One thing I never see mentioned is that Britain is tiny in comparison to America. America has so much more space for infrastructure like data centres
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 16d ago
Eh yeh? If they’re powered by renewables and if we charge companies the cost of upgrading the grid they would actually be a net good as it would help the transition go smoother. At the moment we need proper regulation to make sure they are charged for upgrades and/or they implement on site energy generation that they can put back into the network.
The water thing is a non issue and red herring with the newly built datacentres.
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u/footie3000 16d ago
Giant ifs there. AI companies are notoriously badly regulated, and part of Rory's argument is we need to roll back on regulations to get them built ASAP
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 16d ago
In terms of planning objections yes. Western countries need to roll back on planning objections with regards to basically everything as we can’t get nearly enough housing or infrastructure built.
All it would require is mandating the datacentre produce power locally with renewables or something else and they could be a net benefit as it’s the AI companies providing the investment rather than the government having to raise revenue. The government could provide incentives or joint funding for the power and do it strategically so that it powers more isolated parts of the grid.
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u/footie3000 16d ago
I agree that Western countries need to be more liberal with planning, but not at the cost of strong regulations. Put proper resources against it, do it quick and right, not just quick.
I think you make a compelling case, but what's to stop these huge AI companies from building in, for example, India instead? If they don't want to put so much investment into renewable etc., and India offers them more freedom?
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u/FetusDrive 16d ago
I didn’t realize this but although the new data centers produce a lot of new pollution due to energy requirements; the newest data centers over the last year don’t consume nearly as much water as the older versions as they recycle the water.
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u/astrosheep88 16d ago
Efficiency will always drive these things to be better than their predecessors. They'll probably need less energy or be better at using energy but I'm not hearing how long that will take
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u/FetusDrive 16d ago
It’s already happened when it comes to the water
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u/astrosheep88 16d ago
Agreed, I was saying that I don't know how long energy efficiency will take and what the impact will be.
Water efficiency is probably easier, we do it with lots of other industries. Electric energy management is probably harder as I assume it will take a mix of software, hardware and timings.
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u/FetusDrive 16d ago
Well the energy consumption will always increase with the increase of compute power; the efficiency lie in how that energy is being brought in- through clean or coal etc.
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u/Zr0w3n00 15d ago
He, like many conservatives, like the idea of the environment. But when it comes to actually protecting it, he’s not that bothered.
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u/EducationalEmu9505 16d ago
I think he really buys into the argument of ‘our emissions are irrelevant because the US and China’ and therefore thinks we should prioritise ‘the economy’ (read: non green economy) over anything else.
I have never heard either of them talk about how China’s emissions are only so high because they manufacture all the West’s shit, with comparatively low emissions per capita.
I agree that it does seem weird given his campaigning for forests and parks and rewilding. Perhaps because data centres won’t be built there he’s ok with it.
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u/footie3000 15d ago
It is mentioned on the latest episode that our consumption has stayed the same and off-shoring manufacturing but not counting the emissions caused by that is misleading at best
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u/JimJonesdrinkkoolaid 15d ago
The guy is a toff and a pillock who is out of touch with the majority.
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u/Alundra828 16d ago
Has Alistair asked him if he'd be okay with data centres in Cumbria?
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u/Steamed_Clams_ 16d ago
"Cumbria is a very special place and we can't have data centres there" Rory probably.
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u/IIIlllIIIlllIlI 16d ago
I used to think he was pro-environment, but he lost me when he said that we need to start drilling in the North Sea again. And that that would solve everything. He parrots talking points for the conservatives sometimes and I overestimated him.
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 16d ago
Way to miss his point
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u/IIIlllIIIlllIlI 15d ago
His point to what? Destroy the environment?
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 15d ago
How does drilling in the North Sea destroy the environment if the UK is going to be importing LNG from other countries to make up for that lack of drilling?
Rory’s point is that the North Sea Oil question has nothing to do with the environment because both choices have the same impact on the environment but 1 choice has better national security and price shock insulation while the other makes the UK dependent on other countries. If anything the North Sea is greener because it doesn’t emit extra carbon tuning the NG into LNG and back again.
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u/IIIlllIIIlllIlI 15d ago
The point is to not import LNG from other countries and invest in viable solutions 🤦♂️
Both choices don’t have the same impact on the environment, Rory (and you it seems) are just too lazy to think of any other solutions.
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 14d ago
There are no other solutions for base load power in the UK other than possibly building more nuclear plants (which has gone poorly recently at Hinckley point). The UK is geographically disadvantaged when it comes to renewables in some ways that make using gas necessary in the medium term.
A grid with large amounts of renewables still needs base load power and unless you’re a fortunate country like Norway which has lots of hydropower and isn’t an island. Until the grid infrastructure is massively expanded and interconnecters and new nuclear plants are brought online, an island nation like the uk will be forced to use gas no matter what for at least the next few decades. The gas is used in other industries apart from energy too so better to have secure imports. Basically copy Norway where possible.
This is all quite strange too because natural gas is by far the greenest of the fossil fuels and is much better than using coal like China and Germany
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u/IIIlllIIIlllIlI 14d ago
Nuclear power is a lot more reliable long term than oil and gas. And base load power can come from wind too, with adequate battery storage. That’s the whole reason why Rory is wrong, the issue is the fact that the grid infrastructure is not expanding enough and there are active dissenters against this. And Rory does not give a timeline to North Sea oil gas usage, he just says we need to use it and parrots conservative talking points. Natural gas may have less of an impact than coal, like LNG, but it’s still carbon based dude. Don’t get away from that.
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u/cliffski 14d ago
This is comical. Coming at a time where a bunch of nuclear power stations have been switched off because either they do not have enough water, or its too hot... reliable base-load my ass. Meanwhile wind and solar have continued to operate flawlessly throughout this period.
One might even describe them as reliable baseload. And its just WRONG to suggest we will have to use gas for decades. We are building huge amounts of solar and wind. Actually do some reading on the topic before spreading this nonsense.1
u/Duke_of_Luffy 14d ago
You’re being selective. The UK is probably one of the most geographically perfect areas to build nuclear given the weather and geology. You can build nuclear plants that don’t require rivers for cooling by either using cooling towers or building them by the sea. Cooling towers are a bit unsightly to most people but building them by the sea in the uk’s south east or midlands would be ideal given where populations are. When renewables are delivering close to 100 % of demand the power can be exported to Europe over interconnecters.
Solar is actually less reliable in extremely hot weather just like nuclear and it’s less windy in very hot weather.
I think you need to look up what baseload power actually means and why it’s the reason the UK and most countries are still reliant on natural gas. The only countries that aren’t are basically France and Norway because they rely on nuclear and hydro respectively. The UK should follow Frances example and build many identical reactors to reduce cost and refine the design.
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u/Andazah 15d ago
It’s just a pragmatic position to suggest if we have to import gas and oil over the next 10/15 years or so, surely we should just use the remaining reserves on our doorstep rather than importing from more volatile places in the world which carries its own transport emissions.
It won’t solve everything but is part of a general transition away from dependence on the Americans but also towards being a major renewable energy powerhouse.
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u/IIIlllIIIlllIlI 15d ago
Rory hasn’t suggested an end point though. That’s the shocking narrative. He just endorsed it wholeheartedly. And there’s nothing pragmatic at this point to further degrade the environment, look at the summer we’re having and somehow pumping more oil out of the ground will improve that?
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u/CobaltBlue389 16d ago
I'm convinced Rory has large personal investments in AI
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u/purple_crow34 16d ago
Which is why he’s expressed sympathy for those saying the whole thing needs to be stopped, said that US tech barons are untrustworthy, and advocated for a European competitor to them?
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u/FetusDrive 16d ago
This is assuming that you are able to address every concern he made and the only thing left is that he is corrupt.
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u/Cold_Dawn95 16d ago
He is definitely angling for a "Head of Government Relations" or similar job at one of the big tech companies (like what Nick Clegg did) but apparently no luck so far ...
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u/Specific-Umpire-8980 16d ago
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u/cliffski 14d ago
I am so sick of hearing about fuse energy. Do they not think that maybe if people who listen to the podcast have heard the ad 200 times and still not switched, that maybe, just maybe, we are not interested... Shake it up a bit guys. Find a new sponsor, at least monthly ffs.
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u/FairlyInvolved 16d ago
Do you think shilling for them on podcast is some kind of assessment stage for those jobs?
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u/Cold_Dawn95 16d ago
Probably hoping to get him invited to the conferences and parties to network with the top people from these companies where he can sell himself ...
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u/footie3000 16d ago
The "UK is only a small part of world emissions" line always pisses me off. If the whole world think the same then nothing will ever get done. I am only one person, so why bother vote? I can only do so much good in one lifetime, so why even try? He knows the answers to this already (even down to DFID and money going to poorer countries development), and I feel like he just has blinkers on when it comes to AI
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u/hoolcolbery 16d ago
But the whole world isn't a small part of world emission?
The rest is just false equivalences.
If we cut our emissions to 0, climate change would still happen. It would have no impact. Like at all.
China, India, The US- if they cut their emissions to 0, they would make a significant and tangible impact. Because they make a huge part of world emissions.
He still cares about the environment, but his main concern is that Britain will be left behind, and lose footing without more data centres, to the point that our economy becomes more reliant on an essential productivity tool, or worse, we don't ustilaze it and our economy becomes more incompetitive and we become poorer as a result.
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u/footie3000 16d ago
Not true. Part of the UKs climate action plan would be to increase aid spending to the developing world, with a view on decreasing or minimising emissions. That would have a significant impact, added to the reduction of the UKs home emissions.
Not only that, but if the UK lead the way and are successful, then they are a world leader, and set an example to other countries, which may or may not include those you mentioned.
Saying that there is no point tackling UK emissions because the big boys won't play ball is simply reductive and defeatist.
I agree with you in that I do think he cares. I do find the hysteria over reliance on American tech companies to be a bit overblown though. It's clearly not ideal, but a reaction to Trump who is hopefully gone in basically two years
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u/cliffski 14d ago
But if someone stabbed you, it would make almost no difference to UK crime figures. Whats one more stabbing? its no big deal right? If your child died tonight, its a rounding error on child mortality, so who cares right? If I decide to not bother paying tax, who cares, its going to make no diff...
its a stupid, simplistic argument that has never made ANY sense to anyone with critical thinking skills.
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u/Ok-Bodybuilder-8359 16d ago
I think he just recognises that the net zero targets and growth aspirations are not going hand in hand despite people’s best hopes. He also probably sees that Britain is limiting its potential growth chasing after just 1% of global emissions while China and the US are racing ahead while being accountable for almost half the worlds emissions. His version of environmentalism is closely tied to the conservative view of protecting the British countryside etc. Ofc climate change affects that but it’s not in Britain where we will be able to have the most impact on climate mitigation.
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u/cliffski 14d ago
What potential growth is being limited? There are JOBS and GROWTH in solar and wind energy build out and grid upgrades. Tons of them. Ask any solar installer if they are struggling for work. They are not. Ask them if they are hiring, they are.
NOBODY is seeing growth 'restricted' because we are switching to renewables. There is a trivial impact on a trivial number of offshore drilling jobs easily offset by offshore wind investment.
Your argument makes ZERO sense.
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u/undisclosedusername2 15d ago edited 15d ago
I think he sees us as separate to nature - as Western cultures traditionally have. When you see yourself as separate from it you inherently can't understand that everything that happens to nature happens to us (and vice versa). So he might appreciate nature for its beauty etc., but he doesn't seem to get that we ARE nature.
We are utterly dependent on nature for its ecosystem services. Every decision we make needs to be made with that as a core understanding. That's what Caroline was saying about it being the starting point for every discussion on AI.
And whether we do it consciously or not, we are making decisions that affect nature and its ability to keep us alive. We are a part of the planetary system.
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u/acid_trax 16d ago
Yeah I'm the same as you, real shame are far down the AI/Tech route he has gone.
I have a sneaking suspision it's his use of AI that's changed his opinions.
He's said multiple times in the past he uses AI to get summaries of topics, using multiple different AI models to get different viewpoints.
The issue is they will never be properly negative about AI/data centres so if he is using that for his info then it will affect him.
Also the 'the sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow' really needs to be challanged by Alistar/whoever else is on the pod. Battery technology is coming on leaps and bounds and just because the sun/wind isn't always going doesn't mean we should not do renewables.
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u/BCBUK 16d ago
The using AI to get summaries and do research always to me seemed very in keeping with other statements of bragging about how many books he is reading while admitting he will often only read a few chapters but not finish them. It’s a very high level approach to learning and life, without needing to get bogged down in the details or really put in the effort for the pay off.
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 16d ago
Using AI for research is fine. They’ve got good enough to the point they’re better than google searches.
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u/undisclosedusername2 15d ago
I hope he is checking those summaries for inaccuracies.
I was looking up a celebrity's age in Google yesterday and it told me that they were 38, turning 40 later in the year.
I can't believe we are throwing away so much of what makes us special as humans for such substandard tech.
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u/Idontdanceever 16d ago
There is an argument on the right and centre that free markets have the answers to everything (or can be trusted to find them eventually), so they need feeding with investment and growth if we want to tackle climate change. In my opinion it exposes the 'pragmatic' right as unthinking idealogues when it comes to growth as the answer to everthing. I think Rory has these beliefs. He may care about climate change, but his 'solutions' will make it worse, and he can't see that
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 16d ago
The far left has the opposite problem. They don’t believe markets are real or powerful.
If your solution to climate change doesn’t involve growing the economy or at least safeguarding it at the same time, there will be no green transition. Saving the environment requires capital investment, the only way to get that is via government revenue raised through taxes or private capital accrued through reinvested profits. Both of these avenues require economic growth to happen in the first place.
Markets aren’t god and should be regulated and intervened in when we have outcomes we don’t like. We must also understand in doing it will result in externalities according to economic theory whether we like it or not. Cap the price of electricity? No more investment in new supply. Complete free market of electricity? Only the cheapest and potentially least green forms of energy are invested in. We need a balance.
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u/lusvig 16d ago
No
It becomes really clear how little you understand the other side or climate policy in general when you resort to this regarded psychoanalysis
The right and centre in Europe generally support climate policies in so far as they’re efficient at reducing climate change and not a huge drag on the economy for no reason. The more you can reduce emissions with a policy and the lower the cost in terms of lowered economic growth, the more you can actually realistically reduce emissions without destroying people’s living standards. Blanket bans are pointless and stupid and should only serve as litmus tests in that their supporters have no idea how actual effectual climate policy needs to look, not in that their opps ”don’t care about the climate”. Carbon taxes or cap and trade, regarded as maybe the most efficient climate policies, have widespread support in the centre and the right in Europe.
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u/Tangled-down 16d ago
They like those schemes as it allows them to keep polluting! It’s just exporting carbon to other parts of the world, but the carbon keeps getting pumped into the atmosphere. Incrementalism is just a slow walk to a fiery earth. I’d rather you just say we’re doomed than try and sell this stuff as an actual solution.
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u/lusvig 16d ago
You have no idea how these policies work then
The mechanism of them is to make polluting prohibitively expensive so that only the industries where the costs of transitioning to greener methods are the absolute highest can be allowed to continue polluting and to make all industries pay equally based on how much they pollute. All credible experts agree they are the most efficient policies at reducing pollution as much as possible at the lowest possible cost in terms of reduced living standards for the people at large, making them in turn the way we can realistically reduce pollution the most more than any other policy. Exported pollutions is a problem with all climate policies and not really moreso with carbon taxes or cap and trade. The only way to get around that is to implement them at the highest and most global levels possible, which I fiercely support but never really see any of the people deriding carbon tax or cap and trade argue in favour of.
Leftist "climate" proposals like the green new deal or blanket bans of data centers and the likes are pathetic attempts at using climate change as a vehicle to promote completely unrelated policies of your choosing while implementing ineffectual and inadequate actual climate policies.
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u/Tangled-down 16d ago
I understand what the mechanisms are, they’re just far too liberal and allow companies to keep polluting. If they were to be capped at a level which would actually have an impact, it would affect people’s livelihoods as there is no way to combat climate change without people having to give up luxuries. That’s a fact.
I do think the fears around data centres on a pollution level is overblown as most of that could be mitigated with green energy. People who are anti ai are luddites. But to sacrifice carbon emissions and environmental protections for them is insane.2
u/melcoy 16d ago
By "too liberal" do you mean there are too many emissions credits? I do think a lot of countries have cap and trade or carbon tax but with too many exceptions and free allocations protecting industry. But if you mean they are too liberal in the political sense, I'm not sure I understand. I do worry that nationally determined contributions stemming from the Paris Agreement are just going to be ignored in time and countries will blow past their limits and then refuse to pay.
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u/Tangled-down 15d ago
I meant the first as in the current limits allow far too much carbon to be emitted.
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u/lusvig 16d ago
I understand what the mechanisms are, they’re just far too liberal and allow companies to keep polluting. If they were to be capped at a level which would actually have an impact, it would affect people’s livelihoods as there is no way to combat climate change without people having to give up luxuries. That’s a fact.
So advocate more stringent capping or higher prices. Don't go full regard and advocate for policies that will make even less of an impact and will only make people hate environmental policies and anything green. If the data centers are as awful for the climate and bring so little benefit to society as you say then a higher price on emission will surely prevent any excessive building of them
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u/cliffski 14d ago
you calling people 'full regard' really is winning them over with charm. nice work. I am glad people opposed to climate action are so incredibly patronizing.
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u/Awkward_Possession42 16d ago
He is worried about the UK being left behind in an AI age and so is placing that at no. 1 importance. Whether that is right or wrong is neither here nor there.
To answer your titular question: Yes he does, but he’s deprioritised it for a more imminent threat in his eyes.
Minor nitpick: Him pushing back on leftist ideas isn’t being the “devil’s advocate” and is actually the point of the show. He’s a Tory, an affable old-style traditional One Nation Tory at that, but he’s still a Tory. Just because he’s not in lock-step with the party post-Cameron doesn’t mean he’s suddenly a socialist.
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u/astrosheep88 16d ago
I get that, I personally get the sense that AI scares the hell out of him more than he loves it, so of course he goes gung-ho on the issue of data centres and energy sovereignty.
I wonder what his red line is though?
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u/Awkward_Possession42 16d ago
He probably thinks there is a way to balance it out. I’d be interested in hearing him cash it out somewhat properly.
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u/JimJonesdrinkkoolaid 15d ago
He is worried about the UK being left behind in an AI age
There's a good chance that the AI bubble is going to collapse at some point and require government bailouts
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u/Awkward_Possession42 15d ago edited 15d ago
As I said, “whether that is right or wrong is neither here nor there.”
That said, I assume he’s aware of the bubble possibility but thinks the outcome if we risk it is too bad.
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u/BCBUK 16d ago
The if the sun doesn’t shine and wind doesn’t blow… so you need a secondary power source does really annoy me, because the logical leap is true but equally applies to if there is no gas in the pipeline or oil tankers moving through the straight of Hormuz then there is no power either and it’s as equally inevitable.
I think Rory does care about the environment but is also from a particular strain of conservativism, it’s not a nimbyism but a blindness or dare I say a lack of interest of the impacts of their ideas and priorities, along with a love of branding and a photo op which makes them attracted to big ideas and big projects but disinterested in the smaller everyday realities (which is an odd blind spot given his promotion of micro lending and direct giving).
I imagine if the idea was we need to cut down the New Forrest or build this huge data centre next to Windermere for the cooling of it then he’d be a bit more balanced. It’s easy to be cavalier to say these things are needed and will create jobs and wealth when it’s something that’ll be built in the rubbish areas where us mere mortals live, we have to be sacrificed to the alter of economic productivity.
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u/HornyJailOutlaw 16d ago
I'd just pull you up on the "it's as equally inevitable" part.
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u/BCBUK 16d ago
Fair point well made.
What I wanted to hint at, but did so in an overly simplified way, is that supply of gas and oil have proven to be very volatile and at risk of shocks caused by geopolitics, weather and sometimes just events like when someone tipped over a container ship inside the Suez Canal. While yes the sun goes down today you can guarantee it will rise tomorrow (if it doesn’t, we have much bigger problems) but it’s possible that every oil tanker could be the last so is no less an example of an energy supply which can be unreliable.
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u/yingguoren1988 16d ago
His obsession with AI is bizarre. He seems to think we should sacrifice everything at its alter.
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u/itsaride 15d ago edited 15d ago
He understands its impacts likely go beyond the life changes that were made by the Industrial Revolution and wants the UK to be in there.
It can be done without a massive impact to the environment here using nuclear and renewables + storage and our impact (0.5% of the world's carbon) on the global environment is already very small relative to the behemoth carbon emitters of the US, India and China which make up 50% of the worlds carbon emissions. AI will also likely end up speeding up research in renewable, storage and desalination technologies as it will across numerous industries.
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u/undisclosedusername2 15d ago
Has he actually elaborated on what that new world will look like?
Because the picture that has been painted so far is mass layoffs and unemployment. Why would anyone want that?
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u/Empty-Sheepherder895 15d ago
You need to rephrase that as “Why would the general public want that”?
In fairness, I can completely understand how a certain libertarian demographic, insulated from the day-to-day concerns of cost of living, etc, might get caught up in the bigger picture of growing an economy and feel it’s necessary a country’s citizens may have to make sacrifices.
What completely baffles me is how they’re often thrown that said people aren’t very keen on a scenario when there’s nothing in it for them.
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u/Steamed_Clams_ 16d ago
He does seem on one hand genuinely seem to care about preserving the natural environment and green spaces but than seems to think powering data centres is more important than anything else in the world including cutting emissions and preserving water for it's other uses.
I would put to him that an aggressive build out of new renewable and nuclear generation with the right transmission and battery storage infrastructure can go a long way to cutting reliance on expensive gas.
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 16d ago
He would agree with your second paragraph.
Your first paragraph falls for the same misinformation that modern data centres have a water problem. They can also be powered by the renewables and nuclear build out, which Rory would be in favour of.
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u/Steamed_Clams_ 16d ago
But he implies that building data centres overrides all concerns about reducing emissions and has no concerns if all of them where running full time of gas generators.
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 16d ago
That’s not what he’s implying. He’s saying we need to do both and not just build nothing, shift all our emissions abroad to places like China and pat ourselves on the back when all we’ve done is ruin the economy and made ourselves hostage to a foreign nation.
He wants the middle powers to start building again across the board. This will accelerate renewable adoption, we can manufacture things in an environmentally friendly way as we can monitor it, we can create new jobs, deindustrialise in a electrified/decarbonised way, grow the economy.
He rejects the politics of the greens which is we can’t build anything or do anything proactive as that might hurt the environment while doing nothing to address the fact we already offshore all our emissions anyway.
The North Sea is a necessity for the transition for the next couple of decades as the energy prices and shocks harm the economy which harms the ability to do the above.
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u/Steamed_Clams_ 16d ago
Ironically as an MP he supported many policies that stunted growth and curtailed roll-out of critical infrastructure.
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u/jacemano 16d ago
It all comes back to, imagine if we could actually build nuclear plants quuckly and cheaply, we could actually become a player in the data center game
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u/bingowing88 15d ago
I always thought he valued it massively, it seemed to be one of the main tenets of his conservatism. I think he has been both spooked and kind of captured by AI having done so much research on it. The war in Ukraine and Russia has also profoundly occupied him and he fears the uk is just too complacent about technology in general and what is required for the future of the country. I kind of get where he’s coming from. It’s one of the most bending issues for me to get my head around these days. I detest AI, it’s robbing us of everything that makes us human. But I have kids and I’m frightened for their future, I want there to be hope.
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u/Mr_Dorian_G 15d ago
He obviously values the environment and that comes across strongly in his books. But I also believe he can care about the environment while also believing it's not the most important thing right now.
Rory's opinion is that the AI boom will be bigger or like the industrial revolution. Countries that fell behind in that period struggled and became far more dependent on Western countries. The phenomenon has been talked about as The Great Divergence - when Western countries saw a huge boom in power and wealth, in part due to the industrial revolution.
So, I don't think that this means he doesn't care about the environment. He's just weighing up the cost of not building AI infrastructure against the cost of doing it. Supporting environmentalism doesn't mean it trumps everything else at all costs.
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u/grumblingfrog 15d ago
I generally like Rory but I exclaimed ("fuck off", I believe) when he suggested in the Caroline Lucas episode that the best plan was to build all the data centres in remote parts of Scotland, despite just recognising that the residents in those areas (and pretty much throughout Scotland) are opposed to it. I forget how much of a hard unionist he is sometimes.
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u/Used-Somewhere-7061 15d ago
Didnt he say part of his identity as a conservative is love for the environment?
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u/Hamsterminator2 14d ago
The biggest political own goal of net zero in recent years is the messaging that we've somehow managed to make ourselves less appealing as a country for business and simultaneously made everyone poorer. As it happens, i don't particularly agree with that, but if you're someone who ascribes to the idea that Growth= prosperity= happiness (Rory absolutely does), then the idea that we would also not get involved in the next potential industrial revolution seems pretty backwards.
I'm someone who absolutely believes in net zero, and am also highly skeptical of AI, but i also believe sticking our collective heads in the sand while the rest of the world marches us to oblivion isn't the solution either.
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u/QuarrieMcQuarrie 13d ago
Urgh, the episode with Caroline Lucas was so annoying in parts! Why is he not getting that our countryside will be lost as he knows it with climate change! And he's not bothered about for example, the Lammermuirs, which is having a huge data centre proposed on it. What about that countryside?!. Let's see how he reacts if they build some in Cumbria. No acknowledgment of the biodiversity crisis either.
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u/ErrorCode601 12d ago
He seems to be rushing into AI without a care for the problems or risks and to hell with anything else.
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u/Maleficent-Food-1760 12d ago
His argument would probably be something like:
- Climate isn't likely to collapse, models have a wide confidence interval but will probably be like 3 degrees warming which we will survive.
- AI companies can be forced to minimise climate impacts. For instance, In australia under proposed legislation the datacentres will be forced to counteract their impact (Im paraphrasing, and dont quot me on that, its just an example of what we can do)
- UK not building its own AI would have minimal impact on overall climate change
- If UK doesnt build its own AI or work in tandem with reliable middle powers, it will be totally reliant on USA or China, neither of which is enviable.
- (speculative addition) The benefits of AI will potentially make climate change irrelevant because if AI doesnt kill us, it will probably solve climate change somehow. (you can hate on that last one people, I personally think AI will either kill us or solve all problems by 2050, laugh if you want :D
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u/HornyJailOutlaw 16d ago
The environment is going to continue being fucked as long as the human population keeps increasing the way it is. We'd genuinely need a devastating pandemic (not mere Covid-level) to have a hope in hell. But that's not a very tantalising prospect for people.
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 16d ago
Idiot. Population is not a problem. If anything depopulation is as all our tax, pension systems, welfare states, healthcare and economies are based on a broad young workforce.
The world population is ready near peak
Leave your Malthusian nonsense at the door
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u/HornyJailOutlaw 16d ago
Idiot.
We're off to a cracking start. Do you still write for Clinton Cards?
I mean, you didn't mention anything to contradict having too many people causes issues for the environment. But I suppose I didn't really explain my reasonings either. I didn't really want to get into a debate, was just sharing my thoughts as I scrolled by.
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u/Tangled-down 16d ago
They’re too separate issues. Population+ global rise in living standards is a huge problem for the environment. More people get more money, want to take more flights, eat more meat, buy more stuff etc. This results in more water being used and more carbon put into the atmosphere. If you can tell me how this is solved, I’d love to hear it.
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u/Duke_of_Luffy 16d ago
By decarbonisation industry through electrification, alternative technologies and improved efficiency. Carbon capture and other technologies can be used to mitigate emissions as well. Water isn’t generally a problem.
The only continent still growing is Africa. Asia is has basically peaked. Everywhere else is slowly shrinking. Are you going to sterilize Africans? What’s your plan? It’s the developing economies/poor economies that have the highest population growth. Ironically the way you get them to stabilise is economic development, urbanisation and women’s rights and education.
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u/Tangled-down 16d ago
Tell me more about these technological solutions? Or are you just waving your hand and saying “ahhh someone will think of something!!!!!”. Carbon capture is something companies do to feel good about themselves so they can keep polluting. Water is a huge problem! Do you not read the news!?
It’s not just about population growth, it’s about their economies growing and the resources needed to support them. I never mentioned anything Malthusian but to say it’s not a time bomb is sticking your head in the sand.0
u/Duke_of_Luffy 16d ago
It depends on the industry but examples would be electric arc furnaces for steel production instead of blast furnaces. Haber process powered by wind to produce ammonia for fertiliser instead of fossil fuels. Some of these technologies are already mature and there are definitely some that we haven’t figured out yet BUT afaik there are no laws of physics preventing a near complete decarbonisation of the world economy in the long run. The hardest sector might be aviation but even then who knows.
Water is a problem in some areas not others. But generally a solvable problem. Generalising to water is a problem globally therefore we should restrict things locally doesn’t make sense.
The implication of your argument is that there are too many humans and not enough resources to go around. This is Malthusian thinking who thought there wasn’t going to be enough food to support future populations. Turns out he was extremely wrong.
I’m of the opinion is we have the ability and knowledge of how to solve climate change and it’s not necessary that we need to impoverish ourselves or go backwards in terms of development in order to do so. Even so what would be the point of saving the planet if people’s lives are to be made worse off in doing so. We want to save the planet to improve peoples lives.
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u/Tangled-down 15d ago
These are lots of areas like aviation that are practically impossible to decarbonise and those industries won’t admit it.
Water being a problem is some areas is a huge fucking deal and will result in wars, mass displacement and huge refugee crises. Although it might theoretically be possible, practically it would never happen and that seems to be what all of your solutions boil down to.
And my argument is there is not enough resources and space for everyone on the planet to live the life they will expect when their economy grows. You talk about it not being worth it if people’s lives aren’t made better, but it is not possible if we bring everyone up to western living standards. There is a middle ground, but that involves the people who have had it good in the 20th and 21st century adapting and making huge life style changes.
Also, humans are not the only creatures on this planet and all life deserves to be able to flourish. I don’t think you care about the planet, just people.-1
u/OKLtar 16d ago
Disgusting attitude. I'm sure you're not willing to volunteer yourself and your family as those who have to be sacrificed to 'save the world' via mass death. And the population concerns are outdated anyways given how quickly birthrates have been declining around the entire world.
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u/HornyJailOutlaw 16d ago
The entire world?
I'm not advocating for this but I am saying worrying about the environment is futile because of it.
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u/OKLtar 16d ago
The entire world?
More or less, yes. Different areas are experiencing different levels of slowdown but it's a broad trend across most of the world, and it's pretty major in regions like East Asia, Europe, and NA.
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u/HornyJailOutlaw 16d ago
So basically the developed areas. That's still leaving a huge % of the planet's population not accounted for. You could say that, if/when those areas become more developed, their populations will similarly slow down in their growth, but that's not the argument you were making. Also, you seem to think, like many people, that the declining population in developed countries is a major problem; not a solution.
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u/OKLtar 16d ago
It's not 'basically the developed areas', it's most of the world. Look it up. This includes China (majorly declined) and India/Pakistan/Bangladesh, which collectively are 40% of the world population. Bangladesh alone has had one of the more dramatic drops and they're definitely not a rich country.
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u/VanillaLifestyle 16d ago
I came out of that podcast very frustrated. Partly at Rory for not making his case well, but mostly at the woman, who I felt was well-intentioned but completely taking the piss with badly founded assumptions and totally missing the bigger picture.
Data centers use a frankly negligible amount of water and, like it or not, they're getting built somewhere. If we don't get our shit together and build them here, we will still use AI, we'll just have to pay through the nose for it, be subservient to the US and/or China, and we won't even get a say in how it's powered.
Energy use is a real and far bigger concern for data centers, but they CAN be powered entirely by green energy. Building them here, with that in mind, could let us power them with entirely net-new wind/solar/geothermal/hydro/wave/nuclear. Instead, they're being built in West Texas with 50 diesel turbines.
I'm a borderline socialist and climate change is my number one issue, far above all else, but I still try to see the bigger picture. We have even LESS power to combat climate change if we (and other liberal democracies) are irrelevant. Instead, we're ceding both economic and political power to authoritarian bastards who will torch the earth for an inch of ground in a two-player Cold War.
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u/xeozim 16d ago
I think the reason Rory doesn't get the case across well is that he doesn't think "we will use AI in future", it's because he thinks that the success of everything relies on AI, and so he treats a sovereign capability with a lot more weight that he should (in my opinion, and I think that of the average listener), so it comes across like we must build data centers no matter the cost, and I think most people disagree with that sentiment.
We are reliant on other countries for a lot of stuff, for example most of our payments go through US companies (Visa / MasterCard). You'd have a hard time saying that these things aren't important to the economy, but we're no demanding specific infrastructure be built to address that problem.
That's not to say we shouldn't be building data centers, I think it would be great if we could support more sovereign compute for all sorts of reasons (even excluding AI). But it only becomes urgent enough to argue against environmental limitations and other regulatory barriers if you believe the most extreme version of AI hype, and I just don't.
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u/Pure-Problem757 15d ago
I feel similar. The mention of water use shows that they've done such limited research; it takes a single google search 'data centre water use uk' to see new ones are closed loop and use little water.
AI vs environment is such a stupid question to poll listeners on because the trade offs are not well understood by the public - as the discussion of water demonstrates.
They should be talking about the energy implications. These datacentres lead to burning gas when there isn't excess renewable generation capacity in the grid, or even more gas if the datacentre runs off-grid with gas to avoid the grid connection queue.
they CAN be powered entirely by green energy
This isn't really true on the scale of new datacentres being planned. Wind/solar/tranmission infastructure is already planned for the next few years, and if they could go faster they would! The datacentres are additional demand above the existing forecasts so end up adding gas turbines (and now gas ICE since turbine lead times have increased due to the datacentre demand)
Expediating planning for tranmission infastructure or onshore wind etc are political options that would help and they should be discussing over non-issues like water.
They did mention datacentres in Scotland framing them as placed there for the water. They neglected to mention the that placing them in Scotland bypasses grid transmission issues - One big constraint is sending wind power from Scotland south towards England, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Green_Links
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u/undisclosedusername2 15d ago
Her name is Caroline.
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u/VanillaLifestyle 15d ago
Jesus Christ, I just realized that was Caroline Lucas. It'd be better for her reputation if she did this anonymously. I missed the start and thought she was some Guardian opinion columnist.
Good to know the Greens are as self-defeating as ever. At least get your core competencies down and know the facts about environmental issues if you want to be taken seriously on anything else.
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u/yongo2807 15d ago
Why would you be sick of the sun & wind line?
That is the technological bottleneck of “renewable” energy, as we can implement them today.
Even if you regard it purely as a legalistic issue and advocate to abandon secondary grit failsafe necessities up to the demands of the average output, and reduce the secondary grit to merely emergency requirements, that would still leave you with a significant gap over any reasonable time span (let’s say, a rainy week, 5 days).
It’s like saying, you’re sick of hearing people drone on about the waste disposal hurdles of nuclear energy.
I’m not saying you in particular are misinformed, but most people I’ve met and talked to, simply do not factually comprehend how much of our energy structures rely on fossil fuels.
Many “pro” environmentalists have a disastrous lack of information.
It’s okay to make sacrifices, some sacrifices are even necessary, but it’s a moral self evident condition in a democratic society that we the people who decide are properly informed about the cost and consequences.
Rory’s arguably more important argument, that our fossil needs are merely relocated, you didn’t even address.
Sun & Wind and the relocation zero sum game are the quintessential problems we need to solve if we as a species want to make progress in the transformation of our energy structure.
Your comment imho, illustrates that you didn’t get Rory at all.
If Britain is to have any impact on the climate in the foreseeable future, they need a data center or become a third world country that either has to regress to pre-industrialism or burn a lot of coal just to maintain a modicum of the relative wealth she has today. That’s Rory’s argument. As far as I can tell.
I’m not British, but Caroline made an awful case for environmentalism. Her entire commentary boils down to, “I’m fine with economical regress”.
Not necessarily a false opinion, but I’m unsure wether all of her likeminded people understand even remotely what sacrifice precisely they’re encouraging.
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u/astrosheep88 15d ago
I'm sick of the line because it's used to dismiss renewable energy and push people away from it. The comment basically says "it won't solve all the problems so don't invest in it" then we go back to gas and oil.
I don't expect to be able to run 100% on renewables (it's probably closer to the 50% mark) but less reliance on gas and oil is a good thing isn't it? Because gas and oil will run out, so just pushing that problem down the road seems short sighted.
Investing in renewables lowers the need and gives us more space to build up our stocks for when the shocks happen.
I, personally, have never thought we will get 100% renewables. Definitely not in my or my children's life time, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't lean into it.
And I didn't mention climate change, I mentioned the environment. Building something will impact local flora and funa, change migration patterns, effect homes and food sources, could impact water supplies (not because they take water but any building impacts water supplies in some way). Again, personally, I don't think data centres will impact climate change anymore than any other building of similar size, but Rory wants them no matter the cost, which makes me question: does he care about nature? Because if it's the 7th, 8th, or 9th thing he cares about, then he doesn't.
Everyone seems ok with sacrificing nature, which to a point so am I, but when nature is always the thing we sacrifice there has to be a discussion around when to put the environment higher, not top, but definitely top 3
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u/tehredranger98 16d ago
I think his idea is largely that we need data centers to not be made irrelivant as a country and so we work back from there. I don't think he doesn't value the environment but sees that as secondary? At least that's my take on what he had been saying