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US quits Paris climate pact

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Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#201

Post by SpikeDad »

aaron-lebo wrote: post #69
pavlov wrote: post #37

The United States of America spent a hundred years building up a global leadership position. President Trump has effectively destroyed it in a mere four months. China is adeptly stepping up to fill the void left by the United States. Last week Trump did his best to alienate America's long-standing European allies, who now feel that they are on their own against Russia's expanding European power plays. So Europe is tu…

You're overreacting and falling into what China would love people to believe, that 4 years of bad leadership is equivalent to decades of autocracy. When Trump is gone in 3 years, it's not gonna be so dire. Stupid short-sighted decision, but it's just a road bump. The Germans and Japanese recovered from WW2, pretty sure the US can recover from Trump.

They recovered be the US saw that supporting these countries and creating strong democracies would be of direct benefit to the US. You know, America First.

I can imagine what would have happened if Trump was around after WW2 - "What - spend all that money on those countries. Forget it. Let take all that capital and reduce corporate taxes".

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#202

Post by panzagl »

gonvaled wrote: post #105
panzagl wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pollution is not CO2.

When talking about global warming, yes. To an overwhelming extent.

And this is why the US has so much trouble with climate change as an issue- first it was sulfur dioxide, then lead, then CFCs, now it's CO2. The US has been doing this since the 70's. Now Europe and China want to pretend they care with words, and giving the US's money to the third world, yet every picture of a city in China looks like London in the 1890's and it turns out those oh so green Euro car makers were cheating their emissions tests, but that's not important, what's important is that we hold hands and make pleasant noises at each other.

I don't see how anyone who calls themselves an engineer can stomach when this feel good ignorance is put forward as a solution- this is rearranging deck chairs to the highest degree.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#203

Post by amluto »

daxorid wrote: post #147
dragonwriter wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no political fix. Only technological ones. Technological fixes will not be adopted unless climate-related externalities are internalized into transactions, because of the tragedy of the commons. A political fix is a necessary prerequisite to the adoption of any technological fix.

There are very real physical limits to technological fixes anyway: https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2012/02/the-alternative-energy-ma...

That site thinks that a source that could produce less than 25% of total foreseeable global demand is worthless. I find this to be a rather strange conclusion. Two sources, each producing 24% of foreseeable global demand, could cut emissions and fuel use by 48%, which would be huge.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#204

Post by guelo »

rayiner wrote: post #102
scarmig wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pulling out of it is indication that the USA's politics is primarily driven by virtue signaling among different segments of its governing elite, not by policy or objective reality. If you believe the USA should be involved at all on the international stage, this creation of new public knowledge is a big detriment to that end.

> If you believe the USA should be involved at all on the international stage, this creation of new public knowledge is a big detriment to that end. The belief that the U.S. needs to be involved in the international stage is based on the fallacious assumption that international cooperation can fix climate change. There is no scenario in which that happens. Without fundamental technological leaps, we'd have to decreas…

I agree that technology is our only hope now, but only because we cannot stop conservative's occasional grip on power and their love of oil money. If technology doesn't save us eventually war, famine and the collapse of the world order will stop carbon emissions but by then it will be too late.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#205

Post by scarmig »

twoodfin wrote: post #171
scarmig wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From your own source: "At a summit in 2014, NATO reiterated its commitment to the 2% target. Members that fell short at the time promised to meet their obligations by 2024." But, again, even in the worst light possible, a country not spending enough on military spending to meet some stated target doesn't compare to tossing out treaties based on a whim.

From the perspective of the US Constitution, the Paris Accords are most certainly not a treaty. Treaties require a 2/3 vote of approval in the Senate. The tradition of significant international agreements made deliberately short of "treaties" goes back to FDR/Churchill and the Atlantic Charter, if not further.

The proof is in the pudding, here. This is a giant bat signal that the USA is unable to uphold its international obligations. Preen about the Constitution all you want, but that doesn't change the fact that people are going to take the USA's public commitments with a giant grain of salt now, and this will shift smaller countries' orientation to relatively trustworthy large countries, many of which are actively hostile to American interests.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#207

Post by entee »

pvnick wrote: post #165
scarmig wrote: post #51

This is one of those situations where you should be shaking your head, even if you're a climate change denying conservative or a fussil fuel industrial interest. The Paris pact was pretty toothless: it was a step forward, but heavily aspirational. Indeed, one of the stated complaints of conservatives was that it did nothing to enforce compliance. The Trump Administration could have just as well ignored it without for…

That is because the previous president decided to unilaterally bind the country to the agreement rather than seek treaty ratification from Congress. It is a risk that ruling by executive decree entails.

I support the Paris Agreement, and I also somewhat agree with this point. I'm sad that the country can't seem to get its act together such that it could actually move this through regular order. Likewise with executive actions. We've gotten to a point where the legislature's navel gazing and strict partisanship makes it impossible to actually get anything done, either conservative or progressive.

As a country we need to be able to have responsible, sober debates and actually vote through policies instead of just working through whoever happens to be in the Oval Office. It's an unstable way to do things.

That said I would argue it's mostly unstable because the Republican party has been hijacked by its extreme right wing. It's astonishing to see that even with control of both houses they can't internally agree on policy enough to get things done. Much less find some sort of bipartisan compromise/consensus. Dems have their problems too, but I think the bulk of the responsibility lies on the very hard right impulses of the likes of the Freedom Caucus and the Ted Cruzes of this world.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#208

Post by exclusiv »

PythonicAlpha wrote: post #75

This is a bad day for the US, since by such a behavior ("America first -- ignore international pacts"), the other countries will less and less likely follow this country (with exception of Saudi Arabia, of course). The Europeans are already drawn to China and India and this will grow stronger. And Trump should not think, that European buyers will be more inclined in the future to support US companies by buying US pro…

Can you explain how Europeans are drawn to China and India given their records on human rights? Are they not informed about the Chinese government? I fail to see how that's more alluring than dealing with America and Trump even with all his faults and arrogance.

I think this move was bad and miscalculated at several levels, but I don't think it's going to have the impact you suggest.

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#209

Post by propman »

addicted wrote: post #169
qbaqbaqba wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you company be possible without any sort of government support(federal/local/etc), financial or legal?

Would oil companies be possible without the US military defending them in the rogue states they usually extract their oil from? And that's not even considering the direct subsidies they receive.

In California we will be paying 77 cents per gallon just from taxes. So the price at the pumps would be 77cents lower. From every renewable energy we get tax credits. Yes we pay for subsidies of random things like cattle, corn, and oil, but the subsidies like the PTC and the solar energy credit are much more in comparison. This doesn't mean I don't agree with it. The subsidies have dropped the price of wind and solar considerably and we will see a huge economic boom from relatively little tax benefits. The greatest subsidies we could have right now can actually be accomplished through bipartisan support. Funding for transmission lines can be lumped into the infrastructure bill. $7 billion of transmission lines in Texas sponsored by the current trump cabinet pick Rick Perry brought Texas Wind energy production from nowhere to number one in the country and larger than three states below it in just 6 years. Texas is planning to add more win this year then the total amount by the second highest state has in total. He didn't force utilities to build wind farms. Instead he built the infrastructure to make building wind farms extremely cost competitive. There are a dozen possible transmission lines that would create thousands of jobs and connect wind and solar heavy areas to high density cities. If we can get those transmission lines up, we won't have to worry about government for renewable energy because it will be politically and economically in our benefit to use renewables

Re: US quits Paris climate pact

#210

Post by tomohawk »

guelo wrote: post #188
pvnick wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is because the previous president decided to unilaterally bind the country to the agreement rather than seek treaty ratification from Congress. It is a risk that ruling by executive decree entails.

The Paris Agreement was signed under the authorization of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change which was ratified by the senate.

The Paris Agreement is either a treaty all on its own or it's a significant change to an existing treaty. Either way, the US Constitution requires ratification by the Senate.

Other countries such as Brazil had the treaty ratified by their senate.

Arguing that we now have a treaty that allows us to make other treaties without following the Constitutional process ... well.

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