Ask HN: I'm just a programmer worried about climate change, how can I help? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: I'm just a programmer worried about climate change, how can I help?

#51

Post by krageon » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 12:02 PM UTC

wilsonnb3 wrote: post #48

pxtail wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very well written, additional ideas: * don't buy new phone every year - if it's not cheapest model then nowadays there is almost no difference between 1-2y old phones and most of them can easily last 3,4 or 5 years. * repair devices instead of throwing away and buying new ones,I you must buy repairable high quality devices * this might be hard but: consume less, create more - nowadays almost _every_ service is expect…

I could buy a thousand new phones every year and it wouldn’t make a noticeable difference. Climate change is a problem with such a massive scale that any individual action taken to combat it isn’t going to matter.

If everyone did it, it'd make a noticeable impact. That impact isn't enough to fix things, but thinking "oh well I won't do anything because they're not doing anything" is not the kind of thinking that will get us to a solution. Act to your capacity and trust that everyone else will do the same. Either you will be right and things improve quite a bit, or you will be wrong and things improve very little. In both cases at least you've stopped making it worse.

Re: Ask HN: I'm just a programmer worried about climate change, how can I help?

#52

Post by ishikawa » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 12:12 PM UTC

Power companies have a great demand for software. By working with green companies you are helping the world get cleaner. By working with coal or gas-fired Power plants to manage, control and reduce their emissions, you are also helping the world. I have worked for the past 13 years doing that.

Re: Ask HN: I'm just a programmer worried about climate change, how can I help?

#53

Post by ahje » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 12:18 PM UTC

y3k wrote: post #23

ppseafield wrote: post #22

Reduce your meat consumption or go vegetarian or vegan. A major cause of deforestation is to grow corn / soybeans to feed to livestock. The forests, natural carbon sinks, are lost, and the livestock increase the amount of methane in the atmosphere. It takes 9 times the amount of land to make beef vs. growing plants. It uses a lot more freshwater to grow the food, and much more to give to the animals.

Thank you for your advice. We're already doing that. Not gonna lie, we love meat, but understand it isn't the best choice for the planet, so far we've reduced our meat consumption about 50%.

Chickens and rabbits are excellent sources of meat and if you have room for it then you can easily produce meat with a very low carbon foot print.

If you have children, it is also an excellent opportunity to teach them that meat doesn't come from the store, and to help them gain some respect for all the work that goes into getting food on the table.

Re: Ask HN: I'm just a programmer worried about climate change, how can I help?

#54

Post by jlangenauer » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 12:28 PM UTC

Although it has become fashionable to decry making personal changes as "irrelevant" and "ineffective" with the lie that since everyone isn't doing it, there's not point in anyone doing it, making changes to how you and your family live is still very important.

Things you can do:

1. Find an energy provider who sells green energy - here in Germany, it's possible (and common) to buy 100% green energy, but I don't know what it's like where you are. Even if it costs more, get the green energy - it's a big change you can make that won't affect your lifestyle one bit.

2. Reduce the amount of red meat you eat. The environmental costs of this are well known. Give it up if you can, but if not, at least reduce it.

3. See if you can fly less. If you fly intercontinenally, then the CO2 from that will dwarf almost anything else you do. Again, this is something that's easy to say, but it's something that's very effective.

Those are the changes you can make in your personal life. There are plenty of other good suggestions here as to how to make systemic changes.

Re: Ask HN: I'm just a programmer worried about climate change, how can I help?

#55

Post by jefflombardjr » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 12:30 PM UTC

This may not be a popular opinion here, but I feel like engineers disease is actually contributing to the problem. [0] Every time I see a new carbon sequestration startup I die a little at the arrogance of the engineers that they think they can beat nature at that game. Let alone in the time span of ~30 years that we need it to happen. If those brilliant engineers had spent time working with domain experts (i.e. "talking to your users") I feel like some of the effort might be better spent elsewhere. This family of plants is incredibly efficient at sequestering carbon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poaceae. At a minimum, why not have a startup that exploits something like this and use nature's ability to heal itself instead of trying to reinvent the wheel? The mere perspective that we need to "save the environment" is a fallacy. We live in the environment, and we need to care for it, it's not something to be blocked and cordoned off.

My point is, yes you can help, but it might not be by writing software or engineering a product. A lot of brilliant people have been aware of this problem and working hard to combat it, it is arrogant to think we can disrupt something we don't fully understand, instead of doing something solo, try to join up with others already fighting the good fight. You want to help try reading and learn from experts in the field. Then with your programming background you might see something in a different light. Talk to people and ask questions from your perspective!

For anyone who is interested in combating climate change I highly suggest these three books, they have been perspective changing for me:

1. Permaculture By Bill Mollison (or this free online course https://open.oregonstate.edu/courses/permaculture/) 2. The Hard Rain By Timothy Egan (Think SFO is relatively green? Think again the 'clean' power projects have been wreaking havoc on the ecosystem in the PNW) 3. Rethinking the War on Invasives By Tao Orion

In addition to that as others have indicated, reduce meat consumption. Don't think it matters? Read about the dust bowl, and those areas of the country covered in sage brush? Yeah a-lot of that is from overgrazing.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10812975

Re: Ask HN: I'm just a programmer worried about climate change, how can I help?

#56

Post by jefflombardjr » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 12:31 PM UTC

throwaway9382 wrote: post #28

If you're a typical tech employee/well-to-do person - travel less. Air travel is likely the single largest component of your carbon footprint, and with high quality communication tools and good management, travel for work is not as important. (Plus I think if folks introspected they'd admit fun is a significant motivation for their work trips.)

Truth. And commuting. +1 for remote work.

Re: Ask HN: I'm just a programmer worried about climate change, how can I help?

#57

Post by odonnellryan » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 12:41 PM UTC

jlangenauer wrote: post #54

Although it has become fashionable to decry making personal changes as "irrelevant" and "ineffective" with the lie that since everyone isn't doing it, there's not point in anyone doing it, making changes to how you and your family live is still very important. Things you can do: 1. Find an energy provider who sells green energy - here in Germany, it's possible (and common) to buy 100% green energy, but I don't know w…

Was going to mention meat. If you take public transportation for your job and only drive occasionally (let's say to visit family, friends, and shop) it easily dwarfs any gas you use. Like 2-4x the pollution you cause via gas.

Re: Ask HN: I'm just a programmer worried about climate change, how can I help?

#58

Post by tomhoward » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 12:51 PM UTC

wilsonnb3 wrote: post #48

pxtail wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very well written, additional ideas: * don't buy new phone every year - if it's not cheapest model then nowadays there is almost no difference between 1-2y old phones and most of them can easily last 3,4 or 5 years. * repair devices instead of throwing away and buying new ones,I you must buy repairable high quality devices * this might be hard but: consume less, create more - nowadays almost _every_ service is expect…

I could buy a thousand new phones every year and it wouldn’t make a noticeable difference. Climate change is a problem with such a massive scale that any individual action taken to combat it isn’t going to matter.

I think this is more the case when the messaging is that people must lower their standard of living. The desire of people to maximise their level of comfort and convenience is difficult/impossible to counter.

But if the messaging is that people can increase their standard of living but do so in a way that has neutral or positive environmental effects, that will be far more persuasive.

This has been the key to Tesla's initial success, and is also the key to roof-mounted domestic solar panels in many cases: they position environmentally-beneficial purchases/investments as luxury and/or fashion items.