Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII • Hacker News Board

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#231

Post by dillondoyle » Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 7:55 AM UTC

WhompingWindows wrote: post #168

epistasis wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Beef is only 3% of US emissions, meat has very little to do with the US's climate woes. The big problem is transportation. Ideally we'd have lots more muxed-use walkable neighborhoods than we have. Roughly 50% of people want to live in walkable neighborhoods, but centralized planning has virtually banned this type of low-carbon living over the past 75 years.

First off, it's probably higher than 3%, I found estimates of 4% in an ARS study. Also, if beef is a full 1/3 of our agricultural emissions (9-10% overall), then that's a massive amount so a few people can have their cherished foods, at everyone else's expense (tragedy of the commons here). Second, beef is proportionally MUCH worse than all other foods: we can't afford to leave a full 1/25th of our emissions on the t…

Cows are also smart, gentle, and cuddly too!

Also if we keep saying, 'it's only 3% or 4%' and do nothing then we won't mitigate & repair at the scale we need to. We need to tackle it all.

https://www.reddit.com/r/happycowgifs/

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#232

Post by dillondoyle » Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 8:01 AM UTC

citilife wrote: post #25

savanaly wrote: post #10

Is it possible that Sars-cov-2 epidemic will eventually save more lives than it cost, through the long term and short term effects of decreased pollution and climate change? If that's true, we have to entertain the theory that the virus was purposefully initiated by a time-traveler charged with averting climate catastrophe through the only means possible.

> Is it possible that Sars-cov-2 epidemic will eventually save more lives than it cost, through the long term and short term effects of decreased pollution and climate change? Climate change wont directly lead to death, we'll have to adapt, but there are models showing more food produced from climate change. Simply put, we don't know what potentially will happen. We highly suspect there are 150 thousand increase in d…

What!?! People have and continue to die already from climate change and it will accelerate.

looking at literally 'global warming' actual temperatures there are examples. 1000 dead in Japan in a summer.

WHO says 250k per year starting 2030 and that's only looking at heat, diarrhea, malnutrition.

Add in pollution deaths (already huge), refugees, war.

Climate change already directly leads to death and it will become more deadly

https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/134014

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#233

Post by WalterGR » Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 8:15 AM UTC

djrogers wrote: post #220

just_steve_h wrote: post #70

The biggest takeaway here for me is that we collectively achieved something previously considered impossible: by making different behavioral choices, as a species, we achieved the largest cut in CO2 emissions in 75 years. It's tragic that only the threat of a deadly disease could compel such a change, but perhaps we may find other levers to help us achieve such widespread beneficial changes in the future?

It’s also tragic that the changes we made cost 20+ million jobs, and dramatically increased income inequality.

Could there have been structural issues that existed before COVID that led to this outcome, but that COVID itself revealed? Much like certain pre-existing conditions lead to a greater chance of loss of life from COVID?

Some people blame COVID and some people blame the pre-existing conditions.

Is COVID to blame for the economic costs that you mention, or are the pre-existing conditions?

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#234

Post by dustinmoris » Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 8:45 AM UTC

rmk wrote: post #133

just_steve_h wrote: post #70

The biggest takeaway here for me is that we collectively achieved something previously considered impossible: by making different behavioral choices, as a species, we achieved the largest cut in CO2 emissions in 75 years. It's tragic that only the threat of a deadly disease could compel such a change, but perhaps we may find other levers to help us achieve such widespread beneficial changes in the future?

We did not simply make "behavioral choices". Whole swathes of humanity were ordered indoors! It was achieved at untold cost (actually, much greater than the trillions of dollars that have been given away already by governments) that will be paid by generations to come. Only people who were lucky to hold a job that wasn't affected made a conscious decision to cut down. I am willing to bet that come 2022 or so, emissio…

The most effective way to cut emissions for a family is to have ({desired amount of children} - 1) children. Maybe if we would have let nature claim that 1%-2% of obese unfit greedy consumers then we could have achieved a more sustainable reduction of CO2.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#235

Post by ido » Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 8:50 AM UTC

triceratops wrote: post #209

nostrademons wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My threat model for global warming is different from most people's (hence "unpopular prediction"). I think sea-level rise is going to be a non-event: the worst models predict about 18 inches over a century, which is less than tidal variation in most places. Changing weather and vegetation patterns is going to be a big event. We're going to see some previously fertile areas (Mesopotamia, Northern Europe, sub-Saharan A…

> Canadian & Russian taiga and the Sahara, for example, become fertile grasslands It'll take a lot more than climate for those areas to become productive. Glaciers have scraped away most of the topsoil in the Canadian shield[1], for instance. The Sahara desert's sand isn't a great growing medium. And so on. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Shield

I'm Israeli and moved to Austria and later Germany in adulthood. I now live in Berlin, which is in the middle of an area the Germans consider unsuitable to agriculture due to poor soil quality.

And yet in Israel people managed to employ advanced AgTech to grow food in areas with much worse soil than Berlin-Brandenburg & with less abundant water reserves (and they also did this back when Israel was a much poorer country than Germany). In fact aside from some grains import Israel is mostly self-sufficient in food production. Germany is not despite being less densely populated and having much better natural conditions for growing food, because it is more expensive than importing food.

If need be these areas can produce food if the climate is suitable, it will just not be as cheap as the food we can currently get elsewhere (but then again AgTech continues to advance and economies of scale kick in). Anecdotally as a consumer groceries in Israel cost about 2-3x as much as in Germany but both countries suffer a lot more from obesity than hunger.

Also as an unintended result of the above Israel is today a significant exporter of AgTech.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#236

Post by yrimaxi » Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 9:07 AM UTC

just_steve_h wrote: post #70

The biggest takeaway here for me is that we collectively achieved something previously considered impossible: by making different behavioral choices, as a species, we achieved the largest cut in CO2 emissions in 75 years. It's tragic that only the threat of a deadly disease could compel such a change, but perhaps we may find other levers to help us achieve such widespread beneficial changes in the future?

We live in economies that rely on consumption. So it isn’t exactly strange that we make the “behavioral choices” that we do during normal times.

There’s been plenty of fretting regarding slowing down the economy, and for good reason.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#237

Post by florimondmanca » Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 9:20 AM UTC

florimondmanca wrote: post #179

lcamach84 wrote: post #154

This proves that we need a system change. Covid made that, we change from a system with the objective of producing stuff to a system with the goal of saving lives. People of HN should take a look of the clube of rome book "limits of growth". GND will not save us beacause it will demand energy and resources to swap all the infraestructure. At most developed countries will shift their enviromental cost to the poor ones

This. Thank you for bringing this up. My take: Thermo-industrial consumer societies don’t need to change. Rather, as you said, we need a system change. We need to swap our current model for something else. The outcome should (and will) be different from a thermo-industrial society — it will be another society altogether. What sort exactly I don’t know yet. But « a systemic problem can only be approached by systemic s…

I see this answer is being downvoted; I’d be happy to discuss points of discord. I was definitely being radical on purpose — perhaps to highlight what seems to me as a blatant reality that our can’t go on forever (and that we can work towards remodeling so it doesn’t happen that way).

Instead, I see downvotes and the parent comment received a straw man argument. I wouldn’t be surprised if I was being seen as an « integrist », except trust me — I’m not. Please, let’s discuss and not fight against one another. I know HN is much better suited to that than some other platforms. :)

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#238

Post by VBprogrammer » Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 9:56 AM UTC

blake1 wrote: post #116

breakfastduck wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All it does it prove how fruitless the prevention of climate change is. A total shutdown of the entire world economy on an unprecedented scale still doesn't track enough to prevent climate change. If that isn't a clear indicator of how severe the situation is then I don't know what else is.

I disagree with a lot of this, except the conclusion. The economy never came close to a “total shutdown.” In most places, the overwhelming majority of jobs were classified as essential—maybe 2/3rds—even while certain sectors did shut down. You can look at various stats, but a very simple one is the output gap, estimated to be 6%, which is potential GDP minus actual. This is a fair proxy for how shut down the economy…

I said this back when the emissions for the UK were announced, the reduction in emissions due to lockdown show the upper limit of what could be achieved through individual choice. And the bottom line is its trivially wiped out by a few years of ordinary growth. Real change needs to come through regulatory, industrial and technological change.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#239

Post by 29athrowaway » Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 10:23 AM UTC

Geminidog wrote: post #227

29athrowaway wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In ecological terms, we are an invasive species without a predator multiplying exponentially. We either accept reality and live and adapt to the limits imposed by nature or prepare to live in permanent war for resources.

We're no longer invasive. Almost every wild animal on every continent has evolved an innate fear of humans as a defense mechanism. We have been the apex predator across the world for a long long time and animals have evolved to deal with this fact. Only in small islands cut off from humanity for eons will you find wild animals that feel no fear against humans.

- Non-native organism to most places around the world: check

- Negative environmental effect: check

We are an invasive species. Our species originated in Africa, then as we expanded we negatively affected our environment worldwide.

Re: Climate change: US emissions in 2020 in biggest fall since WWII

#240

Post by lcamach84 » Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 10:35 AM UTC

florimondmanca wrote: post #237

florimondmanca wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Thank you for bringing this up. My take: Thermo-industrial consumer societies don’t need to change. Rather, as you said, we need a system change. We need to swap our current model for something else. The outcome should (and will) be different from a thermo-industrial society — it will be another society altogether. What sort exactly I don’t know yet. But « a systemic problem can only be approached by systemic s…

I see this answer is being downvoted; I’d be happy to discuss points of discord. I was definitely being radical on purpose — perhaps to highlight what seems to me as a blatant reality that our can’t go on forever (and that we can work towards remodeling so it doesn’t happen that way). Instead, I see downvotes and the parent comment received a straw man argument. I wouldn’t be surprised if I was being seen as an « int…

Whenever I talk about this I am downvoted too. I follow hacker news for the rationality in the comments but on this subject it is rare to exchange good arguments.