- Australian fires, NZ's experience Archived Message
Posted by John Monro
on January 2, 2020, 12:27 am
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Hello folks, Happy New Year I'm writing this in Ngaruawahia, a small town in the Waikato area of NZ, about 100kms south of Auckland - we're visiting wife's family. My wife and I drove up here in our "new" second hand UK import Nissan Leaf, a bit of an adventure our first long journey. Not without some delays, but we got here eventually (550 km altogether). Three and a half fast charges, though the car to protect its batteries, slows the later charges down, so you have longer to wait, and more to pay. Still, fantastic car, if you're into cars, supremely comfortable and quiet, as shared by other electric cars - but regular long journey's would not be suitable (over 300-350 km). But we do need a car in our rather isolated rural community, life would be very restricted without one. It's one of the disadvantages of not living in a city. So I apologise for spending so much money on a car, but on the other hand, I am spending a lot of money trying to do my bit. In NZ, with its mostly renewable energy generation system, a battery powered car repays the CO2 produced in its manufacture (battery and car) within a remarkably short period of time, in some cases much less than one year. This youtube resource give some good information Anyway, this morning I got up, and there was a morning mist hanging over the valley. So far, nothing unusual. But there was the sun, a violently organ disc hovering over me, dim enough for me to look at directly, in fact, rather similar to what you see the sun through solar observing glasses. It's now 1 pm, the sun is high in the sky, but outside, its rays are illuminating the grass and cows in the paddock next door, with a wan, yellow light. The horizon is obscured by a pale but dirty looking yellow smoke, and I swear I can test the faint grittiness of ash if I breathe through my mouth. At this time of year in NZ the sun should be shining with a fierce intensity and be uncomfortably hot to linger under without shade. The air remains cool when usually it would be a warming breeze. My car tells me the outside temperature is 22 deg C. This would be at least 5 degrees, perhaps more, than what you'd expect at this time. I can venture outside and not wear a hat over my bald pate and there's none of the usual immediate feeling of burning on the top of my head. Of course, this is the smoke from Australia, over 2,000kms away, a plume of smoke which could apparently cover the length of Europe. NZ meteorologists were quoted as suggesting this smoke wouldn't affect our weather, but I strongly believe they are wrong, it's much cooler here than it would otherwise have been. I haven't taken any pictures, to be honest, I think it's distasteful wo wish to record the start of our own ultimate demise, but if you want to see some others' pictures you can visit here, one of which was taken in Hamilton, about 10kms from here. https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12297673 |