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Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

bbc.com

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Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#91

Post by bemmu »

headmelted wrote: post #28
matco11 wrote: post #16

> This pact aims to keep the rise in global temperatures well below 2C this century and to pursue efforts to keep it under 1.5C. It seems to me that continuing to communicate just the average temperature increase is a missed opportunity to engage with a greater portion of the population. 1.5 or 2 degrees do not seem like much, but once one understands that’s an average made out of much bigger positive and negative sw…

Also people need to be presented with the consequences. I still know a lot of people who genuinely believe it means slightly warmer summers. They think I'm a crazy person when I mention the never-ending storms and lack of drinking water. Also just dropping this link here as I remember watching it at the time and thinking isn't it great we're not there yet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CXRaTnKDXA

Waitbutwhy put it well: “ 18,000 years ago, global temperatures were about 5ºC lower than the 20th century average. That was enough to put Canada, Scandinavia, and half of England and the US under a half a mile of ice”

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#93

Post by konspence »

matco11 wrote: post #16

> This pact aims to keep the rise in global temperatures well below 2C this century and to pursue efforts to keep it under 1.5C. It seems to me that continuing to communicate just the average temperature increase is a missed opportunity to engage with a greater portion of the population. 1.5 or 2 degrees do not seem like much, but once one understands that’s an average made out of much bigger positive and negative sw…

There's nothing to "keep" under 1.5C, we are pretty much already there when error bars are considered. 2C is going to be breached regardless because even if we went carbon neutral today we have decades of locked in warming.

Why the scientists are not communicating this information which has been in pop-science (as early as An Inconvenient Truth (2006), which documents the lag between CO2 rise and temp rise) is beyond me.

I still advocate for mitigation/reduction efforts because future generations exist and they deserve the best climate we can pass on, but let's not pretend like we are on track to preserve any level of normal. 1.5C is more than a moonshot - it is behind us.

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#94

Post by mrpopo »

matco11 wrote: post #16

> This pact aims to keep the rise in global temperatures well below 2C this century and to pursue efforts to keep it under 1.5C. It seems to me that continuing to communicate just the average temperature increase is a missed opportunity to engage with a greater portion of the population. 1.5 or 2 degrees do not seem like much, but once one understands that’s an average made out of much bigger positive and negative sw…

Yes. In first approximation, if we reach a global temperature increase of X degrees, the actual temperature increase that people will actually feel on land will be double that. Oceans are warming up much more slowly because they are so deep and trap all the heat.

See this tweet: https://twitter.com/JFrancisClimate/status/13877671305657917...

And on top of that, there will be much higher temperature swings.

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#95

Post by mytailorisrich »

skinkestek wrote: post #31

So now we can get rid of fast fashion, mandate reusability for products, reintroduce basic woodworking, metalcrafting and sewing/repair work in school and with that get rid of a huge chunk of the needless shipping? Or are we still going to go after individuals eating traditional food while thought leaders fly across the globe in private jets (no kidding) telling us we need to change our diet? PS: I'm already a enthus…

These are all marginal issues.

Even at the current level of population demand on resources is too great and will be massively too great if poverty is eradicated (as it should).

The long term solution for both the environment and people's quality of life (I don't think that not being able to travel, not being able to eat what one wants, having to live in a small flat in a dense city with mass transit only is a good life) is not only to have an objective to cut emission but to also have an objective to cut population.

Now, that is a very sensitive topic and so everyone prefers to ignore it.

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#96

Post by ur-whale »

Every one is focused on climate change.

But climate change is just a symptom, and absolutely not the disease.

No one seems to want to discuss or even mention the actual root cause of climate change, namely: there are simply too many people on the planet.

Go back to less than 1B human on planet earth, and climate change will stop being a problem in a heartbeat.

But the implications of such a drastic population decrease are simply impossible for any politician to even consider, much less discuss openly.

Not to mention the swath of folks for whom "be fruitful and multiply" is still a basic moral tenet.

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#97

Post by hootbootscoot »

The actual report https://www.ipcc.ch/assessment-report/ar6/

I suspect that bad-faith-social-actors will attempt, as always, to undermine this report and minimize the obvious need to act in reality on Earth circa 2021.

I suspect that we must come up with social and economic mechanisms for making ALL pollution the problem of the polluter, versus an externality for everyone to absorb.

I suspect that we had better find such mechanisms NOW, vs a later that is too late.

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#98

Post by thewhitetulip »

benlumen wrote: post #36
brylie wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has any means of geoengineering been demonstrated as feasable? Given our track record, it would probably be best for us to scale back our consumption while promoting re-forestation. Nature can likely heal itself far better than our wildest geoengineering ambitions.

I love the idea of planting trees on every available patch of land too, but won't that just fuel more wildfires at this point?

Not necessarily. In India we do controlled burning so we have almost 0 wild fire incidents

We certainly don't have a forest fire season

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#99

Post by gspr »

adrianN wrote: post #80
konschubert wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we should do neither. Impose a co2 emissions tax and let the market figure it out.

A carbon tax that would be high enough to force changes quickly enough would also be devastating for the poorer segment of the population and hence very hard to pass in a democracy. I mixture of a carbon price and other measures can be easier to sell to the voters.

Not if offset by other taxes (such as income tax, consumption taxes on renewables, etc).

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#100

Post by pigeonhole123 »

pcthrowaway wrote: post #74
skinkestek wrote: post #31

So now we can get rid of fast fashion, mandate reusability for products, reintroduce basic woodworking, metalcrafting and sewing/repair work in school and with that get rid of a huge chunk of the needless shipping? Or are we still going to go after individuals eating traditional food while thought leaders fly across the globe in private jets (no kidding) telling us we need to change our diet? PS: I'm already a enthus…

> Or are we still going to go after individuals eating traditional food I mean, yes, we should continue doing that. Our relationship with food is unhealthy and also a massive contributor to environmental decline. I'm not sure why you contrast this with other improvements we can make, many of which, individually, would be less impactful than a transition to a more sustainable diet.

Farming is a small contributor to greenhouse gas emissions and the recent attacks on red meat for example are nonsensical if you look at the math that is used to justify it.
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