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Author Topic: Environmental Politics Simulator  (Read 46407 times)

vh

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Environmental Politics Simulator
« on: August 15, 2012, 05:46:29 PM »
Hi, i thought we could start something; a simulation of climate change, kind of, and how it's affected an economical goal

You start with a nation, (which you can name, or i'll just use your forum username). The nation has an wealth of 1000 units. each nation emits a pollution amount of 1 unit per 10 wealth. so a nation with 1000 wealth units will emit 100 pollution (per turn). Pollution will stay in the air for an amount of time before going away (10 turns). You can reduce this pollution by spending your wealth on it. Spending X wealth units will reduce your pollution emissions by (X^0.8)/2. In addition, you may extract pollution in the atmosphere at a cost of X/10. At the end of a turn, wealth is increased by 20% + amount you spent on reducing pollution/researching. For example, a nation with 10000 wealth, and spends 2000 on reducing pollution, and 1000 on researching, will have 7000*1.2+3000=11400

Nations can freely gift resources and stuff. You might even want to 'offset your pollution' by giving money to another nation under the agreement that they will use it to reduce pollution. However, whether they use the money appropriately is up to them. Nations can also be embargoed to try to get them to change their policies. Being embargoed will cause you to lose 4% of your wealth, but if you embargo someone, you will lose 4% of your own wealth.

If too much pollution is released, the world is doomed, and everyone dies. the game ends. The amount of pollution released is unknown, but nations can find out by spending research money which will be contributed to a research pool. A total of 10000 wealth on money will result in an answer that is within 50% of the real value. 20000 total wealth will show within 25%. 30000 wealth will show 10%. 40000 wealth will show 5%. 50000 wealth will show 1%. 60000 wealth will show the exact amount. I won't know the real amount either, as it will be generated with a random script and i won't look before the amount is revealed to everyone.

Each game will last 30 turns, unless this'll need to be changed for any reason.

Winning/Losing:

If the world survives all the turns, the person with the highest economy wins.

If the world doesn't survive all the turns, the person who is responsible for the most pollution loses, and everyone else neither wins or loses.

In a turn, you should post how much wealth you spend on pollution reduction, and in which way you reduce emissions (emissions, atmosphere, or offsets.) You can also post if you want to embargo or cancel embargo, or how much wealth you will be spending on research.

If you are inactive for 4 days after the turn has started, your wealth will start declining by 10% per turn, (but you will still emit pollution).
Unless otherwise noted, you will spend the same percentage on pollution reduction and research as previous turn.
__________________________________________________________________________________________

If you want to join, just post, and the game will start soon.

Spreadsheet
there are some cells on the right that show total pollution and total research.
« Last Edit: August 30, 2012, 04:31:09 AM by mudkipz »

Darvince

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #1 on: August 15, 2012, 05:51:07 PM »
so basically the poorer you are the better the environment is?

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #2 on: August 15, 2012, 05:54:42 PM »
yes, because it costs money to be install carbon filters, or shutdown coal plants and set up nuclear ones. and fossil fuels are cheaper -- until we run out, but by then the world will be doomed anyways
« Last Edit: August 15, 2012, 05:59:21 PM by mudkipz »

Darvince

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #3 on: August 15, 2012, 06:02:19 PM »
kolok

atomic7732

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #4 on: August 15, 2012, 06:04:08 PM »
*Seraj joined the game

Darvince

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #5 on: August 15, 2012, 06:12:27 PM »
* Bagua joined the gayme

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #6 on: August 15, 2012, 06:24:43 PM »
* Kolokoslavia joined the game

smjjames

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #7 on: August 15, 2012, 06:40:46 PM »
* Rakkis joined the game

I might change the name, maybe not.

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #8 on: August 15, 2012, 07:16:30 PM »
spreadsheetadded.gdocs

FiahOwl

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #9 on: August 15, 2012, 08:31:59 PM »

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« Last Edit: March 22, 2021, 01:08:11 AM by FiahOwl »

Darvince

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #10 on: August 15, 2012, 09:19:54 PM »
no blue

Hellpotatoe

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #11 on: August 16, 2012, 03:36:37 AM »
yes, because it costs money to be install carbon filters, or shutdown coal plants and set up nuclear ones. and fossil fuels are cheaper -- until we run out, but by then the world will be doomed anyways
and the hydroelectric power? we have tons of them here on Brazil, and they are not polluters.

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #12 on: August 16, 2012, 07:32:17 AM »
yes, but it cost money to build and maintain them.


also, rules have been changed so that the formula for removing pollution from the atmosphere and also the embargo has been made to hurt your own economy as well as the person you're embargoing.

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #13 on: August 16, 2012, 08:05:09 AM »
anyway, the pollution limit has been determined and i wrote a script to figure out if the worlds ended or not, even without needing to know myself, what the pollution threshold is.

Bla

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #14 on: August 16, 2012, 08:19:17 AM »
yes, but it cost money to build and maintain them.
This applies to fossil fuel plants as well. The building costs of hydroelectricity are high, but maintainance is nothing compared to fossil fuel plants, plus their "fuel" (water) doesn't cost anything, as opposed to coal, oil and natural gas.
Hydroelectricity is more efficient than fossil fuels, actually it is the most efficient power source and can reach 90% efficiency,1 and the electricity they generate is very cheap, at 0.03 to 0.05 USD pr. kWh 2 (which is cheaper than most fossil fuels, in some cases even coal). With that said they can damage the local environment and river life.

1: http://www.usbr.gov/power/edu/pamphlet.pdf (page 2)
2: http://www.worldwatch.org/node/9527

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #15 on: August 16, 2012, 08:52:31 AM »
possibly true, but it seems that keeping coal plants in operation is less expensive? why else do we (meaning the u.s.) still have them running?

Bla

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #16 on: August 16, 2012, 09:12:53 AM »
Keeping them in operation is less expensive compared to what? Over what amount of time?

Well, not all countries have water sources which can be used for hydroelectricity. Idk how much capacity USA has left here. Plus as I said hydroelectricity also has some impacts on the local environments.

I think the question "why else does USA still have coal power plants running, if they're cheaper in operation than hydroelectricity?" is an over-simplification, because the cheapest solution isn't automatically the solution our society chooses, not that it's even the ideal solution in all cases. In a capitalist economy, large established industries like coal power, will do a lot to maintain their dominating position, for example through lobbying. In return they can be favored by legislation, for example by subsidies:
Quote
The federal government provided substantially larger subsidies to fossil fuels than to
renewables. Subsidies to fossil fuels—a mature, developed industry that has enjoyed
government support for many years—totaled approximately $72 billion over the study
period, representing a direct cost to taxpayers.
http://www.elistore.org/Data/products/d19_07.pdf (page 3)
These industries don't look from the perspective of the entire society or humanity, only from their own, narrow viewpoint, what can benefit themselves the most.

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #17 on: August 16, 2012, 12:03:00 PM »
I see. For this game I'll pretend the coal companys and the governments point of view is the same -- it simplifies things.

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #18 on: August 17, 2012, 07:03:34 PM »
game starts now i guess, i'll calculate the next turn as soon as everyone goes.

smjjames

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #19 on: August 17, 2012, 07:19:02 PM »
Okay, I'll have Rakkis use 250 in research and 250 in pollution reduction.
« Last Edit: August 18, 2012, 06:21:47 AM by smjjames »

FiahOwl

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #20 on: August 17, 2012, 07:34:30 PM »

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« Last Edit: March 22, 2021, 01:07:50 AM by FiahOwl »

atomic7732

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #21 on: August 17, 2012, 07:43:07 PM »
Seraj - 250 on research 300 on pollution reduction
« Last Edit: August 18, 2012, 01:59:10 PM by atomic7732 »

Darvince

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #22 on: August 17, 2012, 07:45:28 PM »
666 on research and 333 on pollution reduction

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #23 on: August 17, 2012, 11:55:11 PM »
you're included -- i haven't had tiem to update spreadsheet.

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #24 on: August 18, 2012, 12:03:31 AM »
just to clear things up btw, you don't have to spend all your wealth each turn. the amount you don't spend increases, so you have more next.

anyway, i spend 50 on pollution reduction.
« Last Edit: August 18, 2012, 08:01:20 AM by mudkipz »

FiahOwl

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #25 on: August 18, 2012, 06:47:45 AM »

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« Last Edit: March 22, 2021, 01:07:45 AM by FiahOwl »

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #26 on: August 18, 2012, 07:57:24 AM »
just to clear things up btw, you don't have to spend all your wealth each turn. the amount you don't spend increases, so you have more next.

I'm going to tweak up the amount of wealth needed for pollution reduction.
the minimum amount of pollution needed to cause the world's end is 20000 and probably it is a bit higher (i don't know how much myself), so we can all make 200 pollution per turn with no problems at all.

yeah, and reply if you decide to change your move or not change so i know you've seen this please.
« Last Edit: August 18, 2012, 08:07:06 AM by mudkipz »

smjjames

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #27 on: August 18, 2012, 08:31:34 AM »
I changed mine back to what I had originally posted, if you didn't see the change back.

atomic7732

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #28 on: August 18, 2012, 01:59:16 PM »
feexd

vh

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Re: Environmental Politics Simulator
« Reply #29 on: August 19, 2012, 02:09:27 AM »
total pollution is now 295. just waiting for darvince now.

also, maybe it would be a good idea to lower the growth rate and the pollution threshold to speed the game up a bit. (right now we will have to wait a while before the exponential growth makes us need to avoid polluting as much.) So if no one has any objections i'll change that.

spredsheet has updayyt.

the amount of wealth needed to remove pollution from the atmosphere has been doubled, so that it's more effective to reduce emitted pollution up until 3000+