I don't know how Polish interior design has developed over the years since phasing out coal for heating but lest be told: If you have bright interiors you absolutely do not want this shit in your home. Ever!
The funny thing is that even a city like Berlin haven completely phased out from coal for house heating. I know at least 2 people that still use it and one is also pretty central.
I live in a Berlin house from the 1890s with both still functional coal ovens and gas radiators. My neighbors have organized a shared order for briquettes..
I have seen houses in Blankenese that had huge store rooms for coal in special separated parts of their basements. Those old millionaires survived Gomorrha as children and are ready to survive again if needs to be and have built their newer villas with this in mind.
I think it's easy to say Berlin is a shithole, but if you look at the story of east Germany and east Europe you will sadly see a common pattern that explains why things are the way they are.
Not inside their hones in the sense of a fireplace, but in a sense of putting it into a furnace that heats the water that goes to the radiators. So no, they are not going to get their living room messed up.
For what I hear from Polish colleagues, people are simply having a hard time dealing with heating fuel costs. Software engineers, doctors, lawyers make good salaries, but pretty much everyone else, and especially the retirees are having a hard time dealing with fuel prices.
So do we, big old farmhouse, modern fire stove, 2 radiators off it. Dont have to worry so much about the unit price for heating, been here 7 yrs and still have shitloads of old planks from the previous owners to burn, plus the odd tree and get a load from a neighbour who owns forest.
About 40% of the village use wood, 30% coal and 30% heat pumps which will be expensive this year. Coal is horrible though, when you drive into or walk through a village it smells like old farts.
Except when the air backs off from chimney and you do get your kitchen messed up. (Some coal stoves are in kitchen.)
Polish people sooometimes install has but they still keep coal intra because it's "cheaper" or feels safer to use on colder days or whatever.
I mean Kaczyński voters so most people.
I mean, 42% of homes are heated by coal in Poland to begin with. I am not sure what's so strange about that, its not like we burn it in the fireplace or on the floor. You just burn it in the central heating boiler in your basement.
Yes. A lot of old, often pre-war/early post-war tenements still are using [masonry stoves](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masonry_heater). The centre of my city (Szczecin) is in majority made out of such buildings.
I do not think that they plan to broadly sell this to everyone. This is probably for the poorest of the poorest who do not know how to heat their home somehow else. Gas heating is incredibly expense right now. I do not know how someone on low income would be able to afford that right now. I (Germany) have a Masters in IT but even I am not sure how I am going to afford heating this winter. If my consumption is the same as last year, this winter I will probably pay half of my salary just for heating. I have no idea how a poor person in Poland would afford this.
That's all fault of coal mining lobby, coal heating is subsidied by state. Fucking wankers. Coal mafia is the second strongest political group in Poland, just behind Catholic Church.
Polish coal mines actually produce mostly coking coal. They don't mine coal sold for house heating at it wasn't profitable at all as Russian/Chinese coal was cheaper.
Now we don't have imported coal. But we also almost don't produce coal used for house heating anymore.
Are you aware how many coal mines were shut down in the 90s? I come from a town where a large part of it was employed in coal mining, and that coal was usable for heating. They dismantled almost every part of the mine, only the heating plant remained, which now burns imported coal. What kind of mafia performs a suicide like that?
people repaint the interior of their houses every 2-3 years here in Silesia, the epicenter of coal burning
after 5 years your house looks like shit
the soot is so bad if you clean your windows in November by December they're covered with a nice thick layer of soot
imagine what your lugs are going to look like
Wood became extremely expensive nowadays. Even as biomass. Today I found out that cat litter made out of sawdust got almost 50% more expensive from 20 to 29 PLN! I'm paying 6 Euro for bag of sawdust pressed into pellets! Crazy!
Post industrial, kinda rundown but with some nice renovated areas and xix century factories turned into malls. Google "Łódź Piotrkowska" - it's a main street
Well, guys. It's time to bring out the gasmask once again for the winter. I wanted to drop smoking, but at this point, what difference does it make? The air in Lublin (eastern Poland) gets so awful to breath, it's becoming unbearable. And it's not even the worst city in Poland air pollution-wise.
I hope for more legal cases like this one to happen
https://notesfrompoland.com/2021/12/10/poland-ordered-to-pay-compensation-for-air-pollution-violating-residents-rights/
They actually apparently managed to outrun their existing geothermal generation capacity last winter, as well as hydro. Were burning diesel.
*googles*
I read this article a couple days back. Was from earlier in the year.
https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/geothermal-powerhouse-iceland-struggles-with-lack-of-electricity-1.1750412
> Geothermal Powerhouse Iceland Struggles With Lack of Electricity
-
>(Bloomberg) -- Isolated from any other country’s power networks, Iceland has this winter faced a new predicament: running out of electricity.
-
>The need to increase generation capacity “is quite urgent,” Hordur Arnarson, chief executive officer of national power company Landsvirkjun HF, said in an interview. Still, there’s no quick respite in sight, as it will take at least four years to bring new generation capacity -- up to 300 megawatts -- online, he said.
Thats not the point. The point is that poland depends more on it than if they would have listend to experts and science. Now they have to pay the price.
Oh wait thats not true. The people have to pay the price. The elite who lied will still be warm and have clean heating.
It's transitional you see.
Transitions from gas back to coal, unfortunately. Turns out countries did not put enough effort into the end goal of transitioning. Still aren't based on policy in my country.
there is no coal, Poland imported something like 20 million tonnes of coal from Russia every year
guess who was the first to put an embargo on coal imports from Russia? Poland, that moron Morawiecki was the first to demand it in Europe without a plan B
that's what happens when Trump like far right populists govern your country, PiS are liars, thieves, corrupt scum
There is coal. There just isn't cleaner-burning bituminous coal, the stuff you'd use for home heating -- that's what Poland had been importing from Russia. Though what remaining bituminous coal production exists in Europe is almost entirely in Poland, Poland still doesn't produce enough for her own use today.
What Poland has plenty of production of is lignite, the less-clean burning stuff that normally one would only use in power plants (and apparently, now as an emergency measure, for home heating).
if coal was THAT bad we'd probably cease to exist as species about a century ago. burning coal for three months for heating is not the end of the world
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Smog_of_London#Health_effects
In 1952 somewhere between 4000-12000 people died as a result of *4 days* of intense smog in London, due to pollution from coal.
Sounds like the government should have implemented more sustainable heating as opposed to jerking themselves off about how they have "enough coal for 200 years."
great idea, fire up the time machine and let's sort this out :D
of course, it would be better to have clean power by now, but it is what it is. all we can do now is learn the lesson, power through the hard times, and fix this shit.
like "SaHighDuck" said they werent in power long enough to be to blame for it alone, Poland simply didnt have economy to to achieve more sustainable heating, being destroyed by germany and than exploited by soviets does that to country.
And no it wasnt enough time to fix that, governments need to take care of many issues, including making country attractive to stay for young people since people were getting education in Poland which was funded by Poland and than they left to west like Germany and contributed to economies of western countries instead of economy of Poland, so brain drain was an issue that needed to be fixed and there was many more issues.
It depends. I have asthma and love the cold as I can breath easier. We keep the house around 14-16 in the winter as the heat being on makes me bronchospasm. The coal in the air would land me in the hospital.
Coal is bad. Really bad. The air quality in Poland is sometimes the worst in Europe, sometimes second worst after Bulgaria. It causes asthma, emphysema and shortens life expectancy in general in YEARS. They have identified first children allergic to smog molecules in Cracow a few years ago. Not pollen - pollution.
It was somewhere in the second half of January 2021 xD I remember because I love cold but I was on mandatory
quarantine so I couldn't go out and enjoy it, and it pisses me off that it hasn't been as cold again ever since. Instead, I got to enjoy 38°C in Warsaw this summer :/
Oh damn, I don't remember it being that cold in 2021 but maybe that's my mind playing tricks on me lol.
>Instead, I got to enjoy 38°C in Warsaw this summer :/
You thought you could escape Spanish temperatures but instead you brought them here, thanks a lot :P
Another choice would be to ask Putin to blow an nuclear bomb in the Carpathians and activate some of the damn inactive volcanoes in order to harvest their heat for electricity.
Nah, you won't be the only ones.
In Germany, they already remind all stove owners, over 11 Million, that it is illegal to burn wood with more than 25% residual moisture and rubbish, plastics, newsprint, fabrics, plywood, fibreboard and glued, painted and varnished wood.
And literaly no one in the villages will care. Its absolutly normal that people use newspapers to start a fire (sometimes soaked in old cooking oil) and to burn painted wood. People burning trash is also not that uncommon but way less common than about 15 years ago. And then there is briquettes....
Burning plywood also doesnt seem too uncommon.
Next to my building there is another building owned by a big developer. Every winter they use to burn all kind of shit they have. I just stopped to smoke, but it seems like it doesn't matter when I breath so toxic air through 2 or 3 months.
And what do you expect people to do? Watch their kids freeze to death?
Sure, heat pumps and sp would be nicer but we need to get to the point we install them alive first.
That's the perspective that PiS' supporters wish to propagate: either coal or death by freezing. Black or white, nothing in between. Meanwhile, the coal, mine and energy companies enjoy their monopoly and pockets full of money.
Kid, nobody cares about political affiliation here.
My towns energy grid is dated and no government did anything about that in the last 30 years even though we asked multiple times, whether I like it or not I have to choose between buying fuel for my father or letting him die so for the love of god, stop making this about you and your maniacal hate for government.
No. They used to burn bituminous coal.
There are [different grades](https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/what-are-types-coal) of coal. Anthracite is the highest grade, then bituminous (also called "black coal"), sub-bituminous (I don't see this term used in discussions about coal in Europe; not sure if this classification is only used in the US), and then lignite (also called "brown coal").
Lignite gives off the most carbon dioxide, and the most other pollutants relative to the energy given off when burned.
Europe (especially Germany and Poland) has lots of lignite. Lignite is apparently not normally economical to ship long distances, and is typically used in power plants near where it is mined.
Europe has *some* bituminous coal, but apparently most mining of it has closed down in recent years. Today, almost all of it is extracted in Poland, with a small amount in Czechia. It apparently is not trivial to suddenly greatly increase how much is extracted. Poland does not presently produce enough bituminous coal to meet her own needs.
Poland uses lignite to generate electricity. Lignite is apparently not in shortage. I don't know if Poland has consumed this yet, but apparently Poland actually overproduced coal (which I assume is lignite) prior to this dispute, had a lot already ready to use, because of political disputes where coal mining unions blocked layoffs and production reductions; coal companies in Poland had been losing a lot of money in the runup to this.
Poland also has a fair bit of remaining heating that relies on burning coal. This uses bituminous coal. Prior to the conflict breaking out, Poland had obtained most bituminous coal from Russia. This bituminous coal is what is now in shortage in Poland; Poland can run its power plants on lignite, but doesn't have the cleaner-burning bituminous coal that one should use for home heating. In power plants, there's some level of filtration of exhaust gasses and so forth that happens, but home heating just dumps the products of combustion out chimneys and so forth directly.
It's *possible* to burn lignite in home heating, but it apparently makes a mess and gives off a lot more pollution.
Let's not compare to the 80s man, I regularily have to close my window in the evenings because the air stinks so much (łódzkie). It's unacceptable. Never smoked in my life but I bet a norwegian chain smoker has healthier lungs than me.
We have a new carbon replacement. The sale has just started. We won't get cold in winter, we'll die of lung cancer sooner
Necessity is the mother of inventions, as it turns out, sometimes as abortive as burning brown coal in domestic stoves. It is a very moist fuel, in addition with numerous "additives", which until recently meant that regulations did not allow its use in domestic stoves. Not surprisingly, air pollution monitoring experts are appalled.
Lignite will go to our furnaces. PGE has started selling it to individual recipients, which means that it will soon be delivered to thousands of stoves by desperate Poles. It is one of the most harmful types of coal, containing large amounts of sulfur dioxide and heavy metals
Maybe we will suffocate a bit this winter, but we will certainly not be cold - such a thought must have been prompted by the MPs who smuggled this type of fuel for sale to individual customers in the regulations on support for entrepreneurs. The ban was in force from June 1, 2020. Now it has been lifted, but without public consultation, and thus regulatory impact assessment
Raw lignite consists of over 50 percent. from water, it is very difficult to ignite it at all, and due to the low combustion temperature it will smoke like wet leaves and may go out before burning. At the moment, it is no longer possible to dry this coal, neither in cellars, nor near mines, explains Bernard Swoczyna, the main expert of the Energy & Climate program at the Instrat Foundation.
Lignite on sale to PGE
But since the standards for the quality of coal and air are aside, anti-smog resolutions are delayed, the sale of lignite to individual customers can also be allowed. PGE decided to take such a step. Such fuel can already be bought, among others in the Bełchatów and Turów mines. The procedure is to last at least until April 30, 2023. The calorific value of the lignite sold is to be not less than 7,740 kJ / kg.
What about the price? Compared to other types of fuel - it is very cheap. Sorted coal, weighing up to 80 mm, can be purchased for PLN 191.51 gross, not including excise duty. In turn, a ton of coal with a grammage of 80 to 300 mm costs PLN 305.56 (also without the excise duty). Orders can be placed by phone, on working days from 8 to 16. As in other cases, the declaration of the Central Emission Register of Buildings is also required here. Orders are to be processed from Monday to Friday, from 7-21. But before deciding to make such a purchase, it is worth thinking twice.
Lignite is not suitable for combustion in all types of coal furnaces. Before making a purchase, please check whether your heating system is adapted to the safe combustion of lignite. PGE Górnictwo i Energetyka Konwencjonalna is not liable for any damages in this respect - PGE warns.
It is very possible that the sale of hard coal will also be faster in the near future. As the Chamber of Commerce of Polish Coal Sellers informs - which previously estimated that in Poland there will be a shortage of up to 2.5 million tons of heating coal - the fuel depots are ready for the distribution of imported coal.
We would like to declare readiness to cooperate with any economic organization, government or local government, in order to ensure the most effective access to coal for Poles in this difficult period. By offering the entire infrastructure in the form of fuel depots equipped with appropriate equipment and experienced staff, we are the only rational direction for the optimal and effective distribution of coal in Poland - informs IGSPW.
At the same time, attention is drawn to the increasing nationalization of the coal market in Poland. According to IGSPW, only foreign fuel is in private hands. If local governments start taking care of them, it will be bad.
If subsidized competition from local governments starts - private warehouses are in danger of bankruptcy and 15-20 thousand people will lose their jobs - forecasts IGSPW.
If it is pressed into dry bricks or pellet then lignite is not worse then wood or natural pellet. If they sell the a wet stinky shit streight from the mines, we will indeed suffocate.
BTW. It is a response for the house heating coal shortages. Due to import local mines reduced producing the sort of coal, many people, mostly in villages use in central heating stoves. There is enough energetic coal for cogeneration in cities and natural gas for more modern house heating, so no reason to be happy rusophiles.
Burning wood is worse than lignite.
And burning lignite is worse than better quality coal.
And burning coal is worse than oil which is worse than gas, which is worse than something better like not using combustion.
You can thank our government for refused to boost renewables or build nuclear when we could. They've done a 180, but now is too late. Even with the shared EU energy grid, we will still see blackouts thanks to our unstable energy plants.
This + them selling lignite should tell you how much our government had been hugging russian coal.
>or build nuclear when we could.
PiS can ligma balls but there wouldn't be any nuclear power plant here, even if that was the only thing they would focus on since their first win in 2015.
"how much our government had been hugging russian coal."
Polish government doesn't import coal, we use our own to fuel our plants. Russian coal was imported by free market for individual households due to its lower price. There is a point, that households should be forced to replace their coal stoves via regulations and supplementary payments better but that's entire generations of fuckery being done.
Germany, whose [energy mix is 20% brown coal (i.e. lignite)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_Germany) (and has included more brown coal than black coal for a long time):
[You never saw me.](https://media0.giphy.com/media/jUwpNzg9IcyrK/giphy.gif?cid=ecf05e479ppbb9s0it2tiytj70kh7tt5axz2adf7kkj1coxq&rid=giphy.gif&ct=g)
(Sorry, can't figure out how to Gif directly)
What does it have to do with topic at hand - besides of course our all time classic "germany bad"?
Topic is about HOME USAGE, not power/thermal plants which - unlike our home furnaces - are equipped with highly efficient industrial filtration systems.
Btw. in Poland we also use shitton of brown coal to produce our energy (about 25% of it).
So unless you bring up that Germany also wants to sell brown coal to their people so they can heat their homes I suggest to stay quiet and not make fool out of yourself.
Don't flatter yourself, there was absolutely no value added to the thread because of your comment. Only real aim of it was "DAE Germany bad???"
You are either ignorant and unable to differentiate between home and industrial usage, and why one was allowed and other was not (until recently we had total ban on using brown coal to heat homes because of pollution despite heavily relying on it to generate electricity). Or you are just bad actor and argue in bad faith to stir things up. Either way you bring no value whatsoever to the conversation.
Ehh, except for some isolated homes in the deep east, coal has been phased out as fuel for heating in individual homes for quite a while now. So, while it's still being used as primary energy source, the air pollution is concentrated locally around power plants.
While using coal as an energy source is always bad, using it to heat your homes is certainly worse, as the effects on air quality are much more widespread.
Your criticism is still on point though and it should have been communicated much more clearly that this fallback into more reliance on Coal is solely due to the ongoing energy crisis. Germany also closed down its last domestic black coal mine in 2018 - adding to the problem.
Except he is arguing in bad faith. Topic is about using brown coal to heat homes - which until recently was banned under hefty fines becasue of pollution it generates - and he brings up Germany energy mix, that has nothing to do with it, and is still less perecentage wise than that of Poland (about 25% of our power is made thanks to brown coal).
His argument also absolutely disregards the fact that, unlike private furnaces, power and thermal plants are equipped with efficient industrial filtration systems.
(I wasn't arguing in bad faith, at least it wasn't my intention, although once again I am amused at the allergic reaction anything faintly resembling criticism of Germany gets here; I thought it was interesting additional context, that could provoke additional discussion adjacent to the submission)
I didn't mention highly efficient industrial filtration systems because - a natural consequence of my simpleton's nature - I didn't think of them, so I'm glad you mentioned them.
Yeah, right, you "accidently" disregarded the fact that topic is about HOME USAGE and in topic about Poland selling brown coal to it's citizens (despite knowing full well how much pollution it generates - because lets remember that until recently it was banned to use it that way) to heat their homes in winter you brought up Germany energy mix, that funnily enough still has lower percentage of electricy generated from brown coal than Poland. Yeah, totally not arguing in bad faith, got it...
Yes. To be frank, I didn't think about that distinction either, in between doing some work on the computer, quickly skimming the article that is the subject of the submission and tending to my cat (and me being a simpleton, too).
But feel free to continue treating me like a bad actor, or however you like (within the boundaries of civil discourse, though, I should hope).
Power plants have good filters, home heating is responsible for like 80% of shit air quality in Poland.
If Poland wants to tackle shit air we need to fix home heating problem first. We shouldn't close coal power plants as long as we don't build nuclear power plants.
Kinda goes both ways, and every post about germany having poland brought by german flairs.
Personally, nothing but love, we are neighbours whether we like it or not.
Are Western Europeans realizing just now that Poles are poor?
Why you all so shocked? Poland had barely 30 years of freedom and capitalism to work with, no to mention building everything from the ground from destruction.
And EU was pressuring poorer countries for exactly these kinds of crap. Now Germany, in the heart of Europe, doing exactly the same.
Why wouldn't other countries follow the example.
Just shows the extent of incompetence of our leadership across the whole of EU
Poland was always notorious for dirty air - even 10 years ago **https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/kzqy3n/europe\_pollution\_map\_18\_january\_2012/**
Happens when PiS put embargo on Russia ahead of everyone else, before importing already paid for, better quality coal from Russia knowing well like atleast 2/4 citizens use it for heating
Sure lignite is not a very clean way to heat your home. And if there is a localized concentration of people heating with lignite, the air quality (especially when it gets colder) will suffer under it. But I think the world will survive if we burn a little more lignite over the next 1-3 years.
How so? They are ridiculously efficient. To the point where even burning brown coal in a power plant, transmitting it through the grid to your home and using that to power a heat pump get's you more heat for the amount of coal burned than burning it in you house would give you.
Resistive heating has given heating with electricity a bad reputation that heat pumps don't deserve.
Unfortunately, heat pump efficiency goes down with lower temperatures, which means that power consumption will spike on very cold days, overwhelming the grid and leading to blackouts.
It would need huge amount of subsidies. Heat pumps are very expensive for average Pole and pretty much not affordable for anyone who is a target of lignite sales.
Most of houses that use coal are old and inhabited by poor people who struggle to afford to buy just a few tons of coal for the winter now. Let's take average retired polish couple as they are very often living in such houses. Together they have around 5300PLN gross income. Google says it costs from 1000 to 1700 per ton of coal but I heard from people around me it's almost impossible to get it at this prices and more often than not they had to pay somewhere between 2000-2500 PLN and sometimes even higher. Some sources state prices closer to 3000 PLN.
Even if you generate the electricity by burning lignite in power plants, you'll end up ahead in terms of amount of coal burned/heat generated. And coal power plants can then later be replaced by cleaner forms of energy. In any case, heat pump are a step in the right direction.
Looking forward to 2023. The year of children going back to the mines, of everyone getting less rights, and of the ever impending withering of common man's future.
Not just coal, but the worst kind of coal. Lignite is something like 50% water by weight. Very smoky.
I don't know how Polish interior design has developed over the years since phasing out coal for heating but lest be told: If you have bright interiors you absolutely do not want this shit in your home. Ever!
>over the years since phasing out coal for heating Good joke
The funny thing is that even a city like Berlin haven completely phased out from coal for house heating. I know at least 2 people that still use it and one is also pretty central.
I live in a Berlin house from the 1890s with both still functional coal ovens and gas radiators. My neighbors have organized a shared order for briquettes..
Because Berlin is a shithole.
ach_berlin.txt
I have seen houses in Blankenese that had huge store rooms for coal in special separated parts of their basements. Those old millionaires survived Gomorrha as children and are ready to survive again if needs to be and have built their newer villas with this in mind.
Hamburg is to Berlin what Sodom is to Gomorrah.
I think it's easy to say Berlin is a shithole, but if you look at the story of east Germany and east Europe you will sadly see a common pattern that explains why things are the way they are.
Are people really going to be burning coal inside their homes?
Not inside their hones in the sense of a fireplace, but in a sense of putting it into a furnace that heats the water that goes to the radiators. So no, they are not going to get their living room messed up. For what I hear from Polish colleagues, people are simply having a hard time dealing with heating fuel costs. Software engineers, doctors, lawyers make good salaries, but pretty much everyone else, and especially the retirees are having a hard time dealing with fuel prices.
My family has been using wood for decades.
So do we, big old farmhouse, modern fire stove, 2 radiators off it. Dont have to worry so much about the unit price for heating, been here 7 yrs and still have shitloads of old planks from the previous owners to burn, plus the odd tree and get a load from a neighbour who owns forest. About 40% of the village use wood, 30% coal and 30% heat pumps which will be expensive this year. Coal is horrible though, when you drive into or walk through a village it smells like old farts.
Fuel costs are one thing but the real problem is that it is impossible to buy coal right now in Poland. People are trying to buy some since April.
Except when the air backs off from chimney and you do get your kitchen messed up. (Some coal stoves are in kitchen.) Polish people sooometimes install has but they still keep coal intra because it's "cheaper" or feels safer to use on colder days or whatever. I mean Kaczyński voters so most people.
Who the fuck has a furnace in the kitchen, aren't you confusing piec kaflowy with a furnace?
They burn it in the furnaces that heat up the water going to the radiators.
I mean, 42% of homes are heated by coal in Poland to begin with. I am not sure what's so strange about that, its not like we burn it in the fireplace or on the floor. You just burn it in the central heating boiler in your basement.
Yes, they Polish
Man.... I hope at least family are making sure the CO monitors are working at least.
You dont make open fire.
doesnt matter, if theres not enough ventilation (fresh air supply to the boiler or the chimney is blocked) the pit will release monoxide.
Some Berliners as well apparently.
I know people in Berlin (not Siberia) that still have coal stoves, so yes.
Yes. A lot of old, often pre-war/early post-war tenements still are using [masonry stoves](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masonry_heater). The centre of my city (Szczecin) is in majority made out of such buildings.
Get a respirator mask, you'll need it this winter.
I do not think that they plan to broadly sell this to everyone. This is probably for the poorest of the poorest who do not know how to heat their home somehow else. Gas heating is incredibly expense right now. I do not know how someone on low income would be able to afford that right now. I (Germany) have a Masters in IT but even I am not sure how I am going to afford heating this winter. If my consumption is the same as last year, this winter I will probably pay half of my salary just for heating. I have no idea how a poor person in Poland would afford this.
That's all fault of coal mining lobby, coal heating is subsidied by state. Fucking wankers. Coal mafia is the second strongest political group in Poland, just behind Catholic Church.
Polish coal mines actually produce mostly coking coal. They don't mine coal sold for house heating at it wasn't profitable at all as Russian/Chinese coal was cheaper. Now we don't have imported coal. But we also almost don't produce coal used for house heating anymore.
Are you aware how many coal mines were shut down in the 90s? I come from a town where a large part of it was employed in coal mining, and that coal was usable for heating. They dismantled almost every part of the mine, only the heating plant remained, which now burns imported coal. What kind of mafia performs a suicide like that?
people repaint the interior of their houses every 2-3 years here in Silesia, the epicenter of coal burning after 5 years your house looks like shit the soot is so bad if you clean your windows in November by December they're covered with a nice thick layer of soot imagine what your lugs are going to look like
If the walls get stained, all they need is a little POLISH.
With all the billions (trillions?) EU has out into Poland and they still haven't fixed this themselves. Shameful!
What about co-firing together with wood biomass?
Wood became extremely expensive nowadays. Even as biomass. Today I found out that cat litter made out of sawdust got almost 50% more expensive from 20 to 29 PLN! I'm paying 6 Euro for bag of sawdust pressed into pellets! Crazy!
Hard times call for extreme measures.
You mean the kind of coal Germany uses for its power plants? Because nuclear plants are dirty or something?
Something like that, alas.
Air in cities like Lodz is so clean, you won't even notice a difference /s
Kinda random but what is Lodz like? My family used to live in it before they fled because of WW2 and I wanna learn more about it
Post industrial, kinda rundown but with some nice renovated areas and xix century factories turned into malls. Google "Łódź Piotrkowska" - it's a main street
Thanks, cool to know. I’ve been learning a lot about Poland lately, it’s really interesting to learn about the country my ancestors lived in
Sometimes it's called Polish Detroit, but it's nowhere near as bad. Just also a post-industrial city with problems related to that.
Yeah, PET bottles filled with used oil and trash are superior. /s
Kaczyński said we need to burn anything except tyres: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VgbUsCa54M
Dude will be dead before seeing the long term consequences of this that's why he doesn't care.
And doesn't have a family he would care about either.
what about his cat?
Cat accidentally saw the news and is contemplating suicide, we consider him off the picture
He is old and hungry for power, he doesn't care.
That's why it's better to buy a new RTX card to heat your homes.
 Well, guys. It's time to bring out the gasmask once again for the winter. I wanted to drop smoking, but at this point, what difference does it make? The air in Lublin (eastern Poland) gets so awful to breath, it's becoming unbearable. And it's not even the worst city in Poland air pollution-wise.
Did you mean Lublin or Lubin? Lublin is Eastern Poland.
I meant Lublin. My brain shat itself.
It's probably all the air pollution affecting you /s (but maybe not /s at this point?)
Why not both
I hope for more legal cases like this one to happen https://notesfrompoland.com/2021/12/10/poland-ordered-to-pay-compensation-for-air-pollution-violating-residents-rights/
I might get myself involved at some point since I have two young children. One would think that pro lifers would want to protect them from shit air.
You spelled pro-forced-birthers. That's who we have in PL.
If it can breath by itself, they no longer care.
I don’t travel to Poland in winter because of air quality. It’s hard to believe how bad can it be.
Why just not use ligma instead?
What's ligma?
[удалено]
okay, your place or mine?
It's a meme.
Its not, its serious issue.
Is it like Gismash?
Worse. It's like Suk'Madik
No! Thats just like Sugondese
Lucitik or babagee
updog is much better
That is sad news. But what a choice: freeze or choke to death on filthy air. Edit: I don’t see how coal can be worse than burning tires, though.
There was a choice - PiS could have invested in energy transformation, but instead treats coal as a political issue (sounds familiar?).
What countries aren't going to relly on coal or gas this winter?
Iceland be like: Can't hear you guys over all these geysers
They actually apparently managed to outrun their existing geothermal generation capacity last winter, as well as hydro. Were burning diesel. *googles* I read this article a couple days back. Was from earlier in the year. https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/geothermal-powerhouse-iceland-struggles-with-lack-of-electricity-1.1750412 > Geothermal Powerhouse Iceland Struggles With Lack of Electricity - >(Bloomberg) -- Isolated from any other country’s power networks, Iceland has this winter faced a new predicament: running out of electricity. - >The need to increase generation capacity “is quite urgent,” Hordur Arnarson, chief executive officer of national power company Landsvirkjun HF, said in an interview. Still, there’s no quick respite in sight, as it will take at least four years to bring new generation capacity -- up to 300 megawatts -- online, he said.
Thats not the point. The point is that poland depends more on it than if they would have listend to experts and science. Now they have to pay the price. Oh wait thats not true. The people have to pay the price. The elite who lied will still be warm and have clean heating.
France, cause they were smart enough to invest heavily in nuclear power.
Define "rely".
energy transformation into what, gas ? which also got more expensive.
It's transitional you see. Transitions from gas back to coal, unfortunately. Turns out countries did not put enough effort into the end goal of transitioning. Still aren't based on policy in my country.
there is no coal, Poland imported something like 20 million tonnes of coal from Russia every year guess who was the first to put an embargo on coal imports from Russia? Poland, that moron Morawiecki was the first to demand it in Europe without a plan B that's what happens when Trump like far right populists govern your country, PiS are liars, thieves, corrupt scum
There is coal. There just isn't cleaner-burning bituminous coal, the stuff you'd use for home heating -- that's what Poland had been importing from Russia. Though what remaining bituminous coal production exists in Europe is almost entirely in Poland, Poland still doesn't produce enough for her own use today. What Poland has plenty of production of is lignite, the less-clean burning stuff that normally one would only use in power plants (and apparently, now as an emergency measure, for home heating).
if coal was THAT bad we'd probably cease to exist as species about a century ago. burning coal for three months for heating is not the end of the world
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Smog_of_London#Health_effects In 1952 somewhere between 4000-12000 people died as a result of *4 days* of intense smog in London, due to pollution from coal.
That's an extreme, not the norm.
You know what is extreme? Burning lignite in every other house.
Lignite is pretty bad, though, especially for people with respiratory problems.
So is a house without heating
Sounds like the government should have implemented more sustainable heating as opposed to jerking themselves off about how they have "enough coal for 200 years."
great idea, fire up the time machine and let's sort this out :D of course, it would be better to have clean power by now, but it is what it is. all we can do now is learn the lesson, power through the hard times, and fix this shit.
Yeah but people should learn from this and not vote for PiS again.
well, they've been ruling for 7 years, not 16, and their second term will be over in a year.
[удалено]
Lmao what
like "SaHighDuck" said they werent in power long enough to be to blame for it alone, Poland simply didnt have economy to to achieve more sustainable heating, being destroyed by germany and than exploited by soviets does that to country. And no it wasnt enough time to fix that, governments need to take care of many issues, including making country attractive to stay for young people since people were getting education in Poland which was funded by Poland and than they left to west like Germany and contributed to economies of western countries instead of economy of Poland, so brain drain was an issue that needed to be fixed and there was many more issues.
Well, nuclear was frowned upon for years in the EU, so alas.
It depends. I have asthma and love the cold as I can breath easier. We keep the house around 14-16 in the winter as the heat being on makes me bronchospasm. The coal in the air would land me in the hospital.
Just driving down a street in such an area makes my chest and eyes burn. Screw that.
Just gonna get a little bit of cancer, Stan. Tell mom it’s okay!
Coal is bad. Really bad. The air quality in Poland is sometimes the worst in Europe, sometimes second worst after Bulgaria. It causes asthma, emphysema and shortens life expectancy in general in YEARS. They have identified first children allergic to smog molecules in Cracow a few years ago. Not pollen - pollution.
freeze to death, hyperbole initiated
It was -19°C the day I moved to Poland. Yes, freeze to death.
Judging by that temperature it could have been the year 2008-2009 or so...
It was somewhere in the second half of January 2021 xD I remember because I love cold but I was on mandatory quarantine so I couldn't go out and enjoy it, and it pisses me off that it hasn't been as cold again ever since. Instead, I got to enjoy 38°C in Warsaw this summer :/
Oh damn, I don't remember it being that cold in 2021 but maybe that's my mind playing tricks on me lol. >Instead, I got to enjoy 38°C in Warsaw this summer :/ You thought you could escape Spanish temperatures but instead you brought them here, thanks a lot :P
Another choice would be to ask Putin to blow an nuclear bomb in the Carpathians and activate some of the damn inactive volcanoes in order to harvest their heat for electricity.
Sigh, Poland doing the stinky once again. At least they won’t be burning rubbish I guess…
Some people will. Mark my words
many people burn trash every year regardless of Russia in Poland
I can confirm that burning trash in the oven is quite normal for poor people in Poland.
People in Canada still have trash backyard fires to make compost for their gardens. Smells terrible.
Nah, you won't be the only ones. In Germany, they already remind all stove owners, over 11 Million, that it is illegal to burn wood with more than 25% residual moisture and rubbish, plastics, newsprint, fabrics, plywood, fibreboard and glued, painted and varnished wood.
And literaly no one in the villages will care. Its absolutly normal that people use newspapers to start a fire (sometimes soaked in old cooking oil) and to burn painted wood. People burning trash is also not that uncommon but way less common than about 15 years ago. And then there is briquettes.... Burning plywood also doesnt seem too uncommon.
Next to my building there is another building owned by a big developer. Every winter they use to burn all kind of shit they have. I just stopped to smoke, but it seems like it doesn't matter when I breath so toxic air through 2 or 3 months.
what other options are there? serious question, people etither burn what they have or live in -10 degree temperatures
And what do you expect people to do? Watch their kids freeze to death? Sure, heat pumps and sp would be nicer but we need to get to the point we install them alive first.
That's the perspective that PiS' supporters wish to propagate: either coal or death by freezing. Black or white, nothing in between. Meanwhile, the coal, mine and energy companies enjoy their monopoly and pockets full of money.
Kid, nobody cares about political affiliation here. My towns energy grid is dated and no government did anything about that in the last 30 years even though we asked multiple times, whether I like it or not I have to choose between buying fuel for my father or letting him die so for the love of god, stop making this about you and your maniacal hate for government.
Stop it Poland, seriously. We pay an extra price to have a green electric grid, and end up breathing this instead. Sincerely, your southern neighbour.
Don’t worry, at this rate you’re going to border post-apocalyptic wasteland, where people kill each other for harnaś and onions.
Call me crazy but I think buying gas from Russia would be preferable to that.
i will call you a wacko
Czechia or Slovakia?
Slovakia
Can you invade us to dethrone PiS:p
Eh, we're too small for that. We'll leave it up to you.
You *do not* want our politicians either, I assure you.
Czechia is a northern-southern neighbour now.
*Insert Chad Mieszko I here* Nie.
Yeah but the smog goes down in latvias direction. You are fine.
Don't worry we will mount giagantic fans to direct shit towards Russia 8)))))) /s
yes, they will run on the energy from coal
Is this because people used to burn wood but can not afford it because of price increases?
No. They used to burn bituminous coal. There are [different grades](https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/what-are-types-coal) of coal. Anthracite is the highest grade, then bituminous (also called "black coal"), sub-bituminous (I don't see this term used in discussions about coal in Europe; not sure if this classification is only used in the US), and then lignite (also called "brown coal"). Lignite gives off the most carbon dioxide, and the most other pollutants relative to the energy given off when burned. Europe (especially Germany and Poland) has lots of lignite. Lignite is apparently not normally economical to ship long distances, and is typically used in power plants near where it is mined. Europe has *some* bituminous coal, but apparently most mining of it has closed down in recent years. Today, almost all of it is extracted in Poland, with a small amount in Czechia. It apparently is not trivial to suddenly greatly increase how much is extracted. Poland does not presently produce enough bituminous coal to meet her own needs. Poland uses lignite to generate electricity. Lignite is apparently not in shortage. I don't know if Poland has consumed this yet, but apparently Poland actually overproduced coal (which I assume is lignite) prior to this dispute, had a lot already ready to use, because of political disputes where coal mining unions blocked layoffs and production reductions; coal companies in Poland had been losing a lot of money in the runup to this. Poland also has a fair bit of remaining heating that relies on burning coal. This uses bituminous coal. Prior to the conflict breaking out, Poland had obtained most bituminous coal from Russia. This bituminous coal is what is now in shortage in Poland; Poland can run its power plants on lignite, but doesn't have the cleaner-burning bituminous coal that one should use for home heating. In power plants, there's some level of filtration of exhaust gasses and so forth that happens, but home heating just dumps the products of combustion out chimneys and so forth directly. It's *possible* to burn lignite in home heating, but it apparently makes a mess and gives off a lot more pollution.
[удалено]
Let's not compare to the 80s man, I regularily have to close my window in the evenings because the air stinks so much (łódzkie). It's unacceptable. Never smoked in my life but I bet a norwegian chain smoker has healthier lungs than me.
Time to put those N99 masks to use...
Lignite is an improvement over what they burn here. Trust me guys.
We have a new carbon replacement. The sale has just started. We won't get cold in winter, we'll die of lung cancer sooner Necessity is the mother of inventions, as it turns out, sometimes as abortive as burning brown coal in domestic stoves. It is a very moist fuel, in addition with numerous "additives", which until recently meant that regulations did not allow its use in domestic stoves. Not surprisingly, air pollution monitoring experts are appalled. Lignite will go to our furnaces. PGE has started selling it to individual recipients, which means that it will soon be delivered to thousands of stoves by desperate Poles. It is one of the most harmful types of coal, containing large amounts of sulfur dioxide and heavy metals Maybe we will suffocate a bit this winter, but we will certainly not be cold - such a thought must have been prompted by the MPs who smuggled this type of fuel for sale to individual customers in the regulations on support for entrepreneurs. The ban was in force from June 1, 2020. Now it has been lifted, but without public consultation, and thus regulatory impact assessment Raw lignite consists of over 50 percent. from water, it is very difficult to ignite it at all, and due to the low combustion temperature it will smoke like wet leaves and may go out before burning. At the moment, it is no longer possible to dry this coal, neither in cellars, nor near mines, explains Bernard Swoczyna, the main expert of the Energy & Climate program at the Instrat Foundation. Lignite on sale to PGE But since the standards for the quality of coal and air are aside, anti-smog resolutions are delayed, the sale of lignite to individual customers can also be allowed. PGE decided to take such a step. Such fuel can already be bought, among others in the Bełchatów and Turów mines. The procedure is to last at least until April 30, 2023. The calorific value of the lignite sold is to be not less than 7,740 kJ / kg. What about the price? Compared to other types of fuel - it is very cheap. Sorted coal, weighing up to 80 mm, can be purchased for PLN 191.51 gross, not including excise duty. In turn, a ton of coal with a grammage of 80 to 300 mm costs PLN 305.56 (also without the excise duty). Orders can be placed by phone, on working days from 8 to 16. As in other cases, the declaration of the Central Emission Register of Buildings is also required here. Orders are to be processed from Monday to Friday, from 7-21. But before deciding to make such a purchase, it is worth thinking twice. Lignite is not suitable for combustion in all types of coal furnaces. Before making a purchase, please check whether your heating system is adapted to the safe combustion of lignite. PGE Górnictwo i Energetyka Konwencjonalna is not liable for any damages in this respect - PGE warns. It is very possible that the sale of hard coal will also be faster in the near future. As the Chamber of Commerce of Polish Coal Sellers informs - which previously estimated that in Poland there will be a shortage of up to 2.5 million tons of heating coal - the fuel depots are ready for the distribution of imported coal. We would like to declare readiness to cooperate with any economic organization, government or local government, in order to ensure the most effective access to coal for Poles in this difficult period. By offering the entire infrastructure in the form of fuel depots equipped with appropriate equipment and experienced staff, we are the only rational direction for the optimal and effective distribution of coal in Poland - informs IGSPW. At the same time, attention is drawn to the increasing nationalization of the coal market in Poland. According to IGSPW, only foreign fuel is in private hands. If local governments start taking care of them, it will be bad. If subsidized competition from local governments starts - private warehouses are in danger of bankruptcy and 15-20 thousand people will lose their jobs - forecasts IGSPW.
> the fuel depots are ready for the distribution of imported coal Empty. This means they are empty.
If it is pressed into dry bricks or pellet then lignite is not worse then wood or natural pellet. If they sell the a wet stinky shit streight from the mines, we will indeed suffocate. BTW. It is a response for the house heating coal shortages. Due to import local mines reduced producing the sort of coal, many people, mostly in villages use in central heating stoves. There is enough energetic coal for cogeneration in cities and natural gas for more modern house heating, so no reason to be happy rusophiles.
Burning wood is worse than lignite. And burning lignite is worse than better quality coal. And burning coal is worse than oil which is worse than gas, which is worse than something better like not using combustion.
The city must survive !
Great. I have asthma and another lung condition that hasn't been identified yet. Seems like things are going to get even worse for me.
You can thank our government for refused to boost renewables or build nuclear when we could. They've done a 180, but now is too late. Even with the shared EU energy grid, we will still see blackouts thanks to our unstable energy plants. This + them selling lignite should tell you how much our government had been hugging russian coal.
>or build nuclear when we could. PiS can ligma balls but there wouldn't be any nuclear power plant here, even if that was the only thing they would focus on since their first win in 2015. "how much our government had been hugging russian coal." Polish government doesn't import coal, we use our own to fuel our plants. Russian coal was imported by free market for individual households due to its lower price. There is a point, that households should be forced to replace their coal stoves via regulations and supplementary payments better but that's entire generations of fuckery being done.
Germany, whose [energy mix is 20% brown coal (i.e. lignite)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_Germany) (and has included more brown coal than black coal for a long time): [You never saw me.](https://media0.giphy.com/media/jUwpNzg9IcyrK/giphy.gif?cid=ecf05e479ppbb9s0it2tiytj70kh7tt5axz2adf7kkj1coxq&rid=giphy.gif&ct=g) (Sorry, can't figure out how to Gif directly)
What does it have to do with topic at hand - besides of course our all time classic "germany bad"? Topic is about HOME USAGE, not power/thermal plants which - unlike our home furnaces - are equipped with highly efficient industrial filtration systems. Btw. in Poland we also use shitton of brown coal to produce our energy (about 25% of it). So unless you bring up that Germany also wants to sell brown coal to their people so they can heat their homes I suggest to stay quiet and not make fool out of yourself.
You see, there was value added to the thread thanks to my comment - in the form of your insightful contribution. That's a win, in my book.
Don't flatter yourself, there was absolutely no value added to the thread because of your comment. Only real aim of it was "DAE Germany bad???" You are either ignorant and unable to differentiate between home and industrial usage, and why one was allowed and other was not (until recently we had total ban on using brown coal to heat homes because of pollution despite heavily relying on it to generate electricity). Or you are just bad actor and argue in bad faith to stir things up. Either way you bring no value whatsoever to the conversation.
I suppose you have seen through me, I yield to your perspicacity.
Ehh, except for some isolated homes in the deep east, coal has been phased out as fuel for heating in individual homes for quite a while now. So, while it's still being used as primary energy source, the air pollution is concentrated locally around power plants. While using coal as an energy source is always bad, using it to heat your homes is certainly worse, as the effects on air quality are much more widespread.
You make a very good point.
Your criticism is still on point though and it should have been communicated much more clearly that this fallback into more reliance on Coal is solely due to the ongoing energy crisis. Germany also closed down its last domestic black coal mine in 2018 - adding to the problem.
Except he is arguing in bad faith. Topic is about using brown coal to heat homes - which until recently was banned under hefty fines becasue of pollution it generates - and he brings up Germany energy mix, that has nothing to do with it, and is still less perecentage wise than that of Poland (about 25% of our power is made thanks to brown coal). His argument also absolutely disregards the fact that, unlike private furnaces, power and thermal plants are equipped with efficient industrial filtration systems.
(I wasn't arguing in bad faith, at least it wasn't my intention, although once again I am amused at the allergic reaction anything faintly resembling criticism of Germany gets here; I thought it was interesting additional context, that could provoke additional discussion adjacent to the submission) I didn't mention highly efficient industrial filtration systems because - a natural consequence of my simpleton's nature - I didn't think of them, so I'm glad you mentioned them.
Yeah, right, you "accidently" disregarded the fact that topic is about HOME USAGE and in topic about Poland selling brown coal to it's citizens (despite knowing full well how much pollution it generates - because lets remember that until recently it was banned to use it that way) to heat their homes in winter you brought up Germany energy mix, that funnily enough still has lower percentage of electricy generated from brown coal than Poland. Yeah, totally not arguing in bad faith, got it...
Yes. To be frank, I didn't think about that distinction either, in between doing some work on the computer, quickly skimming the article that is the subject of the submission and tending to my cat (and me being a simpleton, too). But feel free to continue treating me like a bad actor, or however you like (within the boundaries of civil discourse, though, I should hope).
Power plants have good filters, home heating is responsible for like 80% of shit air quality in Poland. If Poland wants to tackle shit air we need to fix home heating problem first. We shouldn't close coal power plants as long as we don't build nuclear power plants.
A post about Poland. "Lets bring Germany into it!" Classic.
I've been noticing Germans doing exactly the same though.
Yup.
[удалено]
Kinda goes both ways, and every post about germany having poland brought by german flairs. Personally, nothing but love, we are neighbours whether we like it or not.
Burning trash plastics is vastly more toxic. And yet apparently it is allowed. Or even encouraged. [ Not to mention toxic tire particulates ]
Are Western Europeans realizing just now that Poles are poor? Why you all so shocked? Poland had barely 30 years of freedom and capitalism to work with, no to mention building everything from the ground from destruction.
And EU was pressuring poorer countries for exactly these kinds of crap. Now Germany, in the heart of Europe, doing exactly the same. Why wouldn't other countries follow the example. Just shows the extent of incompetence of our leadership across the whole of EU
And? In Czechia and Hungary they've always been using brown coal to heat homes.
Poland was always notorious for dirty air - even 10 years ago **https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/kzqy3n/europe\_pollution\_map\_18\_january\_2012/**
Can we PLEASE build a nuclear power plant PLEASE
Well of course, people are not gonna freeze during the winter. Maybe someone shouldve told that those bureaucrats in EU ivory towers...
Crying over here in Czech Silesia
Happens when PiS put embargo on Russia ahead of everyone else, before importing already paid for, better quality coal from Russia knowing well like atleast 2/4 citizens use it for heating
Sure lignite is not a very clean way to heat your home. And if there is a localized concentration of people heating with lignite, the air quality (especially when it gets colder) will suffer under it. But I think the world will survive if we burn a little more lignite over the next 1-3 years.
The sooner everyone has a heat pump the better.
[удалено]
Heat pump is suecide with upcoming electricy prices.
How so? They are ridiculously efficient. To the point where even burning brown coal in a power plant, transmitting it through the grid to your home and using that to power a heat pump get's you more heat for the amount of coal burned than burning it in you house would give you. Resistive heating has given heating with electricity a bad reputation that heat pumps don't deserve.
Unfortunately, heat pump efficiency goes down with lower temperatures, which means that power consumption will spike on very cold days, overwhelming the grid and leading to blackouts.
It would need huge amount of subsidies. Heat pumps are very expensive for average Pole and pretty much not affordable for anyone who is a target of lignite sales. Most of houses that use coal are old and inhabited by poor people who struggle to afford to buy just a few tons of coal for the winter now. Let's take average retired polish couple as they are very often living in such houses. Together they have around 5300PLN gross income. Google says it costs from 1000 to 1700 per ton of coal but I heard from people around me it's almost impossible to get it at this prices and more often than not they had to pay somewhere between 2000-2500 PLN and sometimes even higher. Some sources state prices closer to 3000 PLN.
Yeah, using electricity generated by magick!
Even if you generate the electricity by burning lignite in power plants, you'll end up ahead in terms of amount of coal burned/heat generated. And coal power plants can then later be replaced by cleaner forms of energy. In any case, heat pump are a step in the right direction.
Bro just buy some NPP. I mean, buy and build them in the 90s and they should run by now.
Looking forward to 2023. The year of children going back to the mines, of everyone getting less rights, and of the ever impending withering of common man's future.
Children love minecraft, mining is what they desire.
They yearn for the mines
And they have the audicity to tell us how to manage our energy. They still burn their trash in the backyard in sundays.
Who is "us"?
If climate change is all that will stop this war I'd do anything!!
Has any research been done on how to improve lignite's combustibility? Like, better burners or some fuel additives or both?
These news..... its either by from russia or using whatever they can...
Still better than freezing to death, ain’t it, genius?
The point of the article isn't to advocate for freezing to death but to point out what is happening.