Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

orbuch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–190 of 267 posts

Re: We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

#181

Post by tjr225 »

ed_balls wrote: post #172
acd wrote: post #120

We need to stop consuming like there is no tomorrow. This is driven by advertisement convincing consumers they should buy products they may not need. Secondly we need to make products which lasts a life time. I see root cause that we need to remodel the economy from market economy consumerism to a circular sustainable economy. Most current economists is saying expand expand expand, but that increases co2 levels due t…

> lasts a life time. This won't change much. Nobody will work on Pentium II, drive a gas guzzler or get a low resolution MRI. It's hard to regulate such stuff. You can only improve it a bit e.g. mandatory 3-year warranty with an option to extend it to 6 years. While buying the consumer would see the price for each warranty length.

Nobody needs to work on a Pentium II- though I think we could probably find a lot of applications for really old CPUs. The main issue is how much power they consume.

My 2013 MacBook Pro retina started having weird, annoying keyboard issues. I could spend 600$ to get it repaired or 1000$ to get a newer, refurbished macbook. However I'm finding a hand me down 2009 MacBook is working just fine after putting an ssd in it.

Re: We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

#182

Post by tjr225 »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #139
acd wrote: post #120

We need to stop consuming like there is no tomorrow. This is driven by advertisement convincing consumers they should buy products they may not need. Secondly we need to make products which lasts a life time. I see root cause that we need to remodel the economy from market economy consumerism to a circular sustainable economy. Most current economists is saying expand expand expand, but that increases co2 levels due t…

> We need to stop consuming like there is no tomorrow. This is driven by advertisement convincing consumers they should buy products they may not need. I think it’s at least partly driven by people’s desire to status signal, if not their desire to consume anyway to occupy their time.

I also think about travel/tourism and social media in this way.

Re: We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

#183

Post by smt88 »

dd36 wrote: post #141
philbarr wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would this "circular sustainable economy" work? People tend to think of there being only two versions of the economy available - the government tells us what stuff to make, or free markets determine what we make. We would need a way of incentivising re-use, and of incentivising companies to make things re-usable. Currently the only way to make more money is to make and sell more stuff.

One way I recall from college is “producer responsibility”. If you produce it, you’re on the hook for its safe disposal. You can bake disposal deposits or some other such mechanism into the price. Such a mechanism would help deter cheap plastic junk (Chucky Cheese prizes).

> If you produce it, you’re on the hook for its safe disposal

I'd prefer laws that producers are on the hook for enabling safe disposal.

This would cover the plastic junk issue, because most of those things cannot be recycled. Some can be "downcycled" (recycled into something less valuable), but that's still not great.

The problem with your proposal is that lots of products (like batteries) can be safely disposed, but a consumer could do something malicious, like throwing them into a river. A manufacturer should be responsible for producing products that are easy to use safely, not for the actual safe use.

We see the same thing in other industries: auto makers have to include seatbelts, but they can't be sued if someone chooses not to use one.

Re: We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

#184

Post by paulcarroty »

adrianN wrote: post #115
Hermel wrote: post #102

I’m paying Climeworks 1000$ to remove a ton of CO2 every month. Not very cost effective, but a start.

You could pay $100 and buy two tons of coal every month and $900 to bury it somewhere.

Buying coal isn't effective by design - you'll only encourage market to produce more & more coal.

Re: We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

#185

Post by Hitton »

baq wrote: post #127
kuu wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This event lasted for "800,000 years", based in the article.

exactly correct - compared to our situation where we have to get ~5% of it done in ~30 years, we're in trouble.

There is about 400 ppm of carbon dioxide in atmosphere now.

Re: We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

#186

Post by adrianN »

paulcarroty wrote: post #184
adrianN wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could pay $100 and buy two tons of coal every month and $900 to bury it somewhere.

Buying coal isn't effective by design - you'll only encourage market to produce more & more coal.

You raise the price for people who want to burn it.

Re: We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

#187

Post by Elrac »

lopmotr wrote: post #149
akie wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need to treat climate change like the existential crisis that it is, and start spending like we're at war. If we can drop 2000 billion dollars on war in Iraq, why can we not do the same for something actually worthwhile like ensuring that our children and grandchildren inherit a livable planet?

It's not an existential crisis. That's not what the science says. There's no evidence that climate change will make humans extinct or end civilization. If that's not what you mean by existential crisis, then don't use that word because that's what it means.

It's anticipated that at least millions, more likely hundreds of millions of humans will die to the consequences of climate change including effects of extreme weather, flooding and (especially) famine. This won't extinct all of humanity but can be expected to severely impact civilization(s), with a chance of this impact being fatal to individual cultures.

For a prospectus of what could happen, I point to the large-scale devastation of (ancient) civilization attributed to the Sea Peoples (https://www.history.com/news/who-were-the-sea-peoples). They're believed to have toppled the Hittite Empire and severely weakened the Egyptian one. "some historians believe they had been displaced from their homeland by famine or natural disasters." -- the parallels to the anticipated effects of climate change should be clear.

Large-scale political unrest, very possibly including a WW3, is something I feel justified in considering "an existential crisis." Your mileage may vary.

Re: We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

#188

Post by scatters »

the6threplicant wrote: post #91

One of the problems I see with CO2 sequestration is that it will be a nice way for companies to suck at the teat of taxpayers the world over. I'm sure Halliburton-like companies have a 3 step plan to be right at the front of the money firehose when governments are forced to reduce CO2 or face even bigger costs (both financially and politically) in the coming decades.

You'd rather the world burn than companies you disapprove of be part of the solution?

Re: We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

#189

Post by BurningFrog »

acd wrote: post #120

We need to stop consuming like there is no tomorrow. This is driven by advertisement convincing consumers they should buy products they may not need. Secondly we need to make products which lasts a life time. I see root cause that we need to remodel the economy from market economy consumerism to a circular sustainable economy. Most current economists is saying expand expand expand, but that increases co2 levels due t…

I'm sorry, but this is nonsense.

The atmospheric CO₂ rates come from burning too much fossil fuel. Not from people wanting things. If you consume and produce things in a way that doesn't release net CO₂, that is perfectly fine from a climate perspective, even if the products are meaningless artefacts of a materialistic life that will never make you happy.

I understand the impulse toward a simpler, less materialistic life. If you like that, argue for it on its own merits.

> The best thing I can think of then is to lower the temperature of the earth

That... is not an action you can take. We don't have that lever. It's a goal of the whole climate change issue. So this is saying that to lower temperatures, we need to lower temperatures.

Re: We need to take CO2 out of the sky – an overview of climate tech

#190

Post by mc32 »

acd wrote: post #120

We need to stop consuming like there is no tomorrow. This is driven by advertisement convincing consumers they should buy products they may not need. Secondly we need to make products which lasts a life time. I see root cause that we need to remodel the economy from market economy consumerism to a circular sustainable economy. Most current economists is saying expand expand expand, but that increases co2 levels due t…

Just today on NPR I heard about upscale retailers and brands getting into the second hand (thrift) market (albeit still expensive).

The idea is “conscientious” people will buy second hand items so that fewer resources are used, net.

But it’s wholly beside the point. They could make durable stylish (maybe not fashionable) clothing that cradle to grave would be less impactful to the enviro than this recycling PR nonsense.

Post reply on HN