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

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

#511

Post by mononcqc »

api wrote: post #377
belorn wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There were a study done in Sweden a few years ago that looked at the question about an individuals actions and the corresponding CO2 production. No car > skipping flight > buy green energy > Get a electric car > diet. https://www.lunduniversity.lu.se/article/four-lifestyle-choi...

How does this differ if the majority of your electricity is zero carbon? Coal electricity is 60% of emissions. Aviation is less than 5%. How is skipping a flight that highly ranked of you are burning a ton of carbon just being at home (if you have coal fired power). Actual rankings have to be energy mix dependent.

Because that 60% from coal is more or less shared across everyone, but flights are, on the global scale, a luxury item. In many cases, taking a transatlantic flight emits more CO2 equivalent than your average person commuting for a year.

So even though aviation is a small part of it all, it is one of the individual actions able to have outsized impact, usually for leisure or at least often for non-essential reasons.

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

#512

Post by brbrodude »

whiddershins wrote: post #436

The notion that humanity would go extinct from any of this is absolutely unrealistic. What we are talking about is at worst massive economic damage and loss of life, similar to a very serious war. Which is horrible, but really not the threat it is made out to be. Moreover, since these changes happen relatively slowly (compared to bombs and such) much of the loss of life can be mitigated. So we are talking economic da…

The instabilities that come from it may very well put us into a full blown dark age, the economic & societal stresses may bring dialogue to a halt, civil & military conflicts most certainly will rise along with it and with it the world would accelerate in the way of catastrophe instead of moving towards adapting or fixing. It won't go down well, you're deluding yourself if you think it won't propagate to the rest of reality. It would be a self-reinforcing loop of tragedies, downward spiraling.

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

#513

Post by engineer_22 »

londons_explore wrote: post #301
nosianu wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It’s just so hard to know what actions have what impact on CO2 production Not really. For some reason the actually quite simple problem is needlessly complicated in the discussions. Stop digging up ANY carbon from below ground where it was safely buried. Any carbon above ground is part of the cycle that includes atmospheric CO2. You need huge effort to change how much of it is in CO2 form at any time while still ha…

> Stop digging up ANY carbon from below ground where it was safely buried. If a country does this today, they will be at a severe economic disadvantage compared to a neighbouring country which continues using coal. All their manufactured goods will end up more expensive, nobody will buy their exports, and their population and economy will suffer. Only a few countries have done this to any extent, and they are countri…

The US Military runs on fossil fuels.

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

#514

Post by tirpen »

aivisol wrote: post #379
belorn wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There were a study done in Sweden a few years ago that looked at the question about an individuals actions and the corresponding CO2 production. No car > skipping flight > buy green energy > Get a electric car > diet. https://www.lunduniversity.lu.se/article/four-lifestyle-choi...

The highest bar in the chart says "have one fewer child". It actually exceeds any others by extremely large margin [0]. How is that even considered as the option? One child less means halving population after every generation. Eliminate the population and problem solved? [0] https://www.lunduniversity.lu.se/drimage/1120/630/4832/fourc...

> One child less means halving population after every generation

I really don't see the problem here? It's not like having a large population is in itself a noble goal that makes life better for people.

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

#516

Post by bradleyjg »

ihuk wrote: post #478

We bought an expensive washing machine 3 years ago thinking it will last us a long time. It already broke down twice. It's been broken for almost a month now waiting for parts and whatnot. There's a good chance we'll have to get another one. Does Electrolux/AEG care? No. They don't care about the environment, their only obligation is to their shareholders. But frankly neither do I anymore. Next time, I'll buy the che…

> ordinary people are tasked with saving the planet

I can’t read minds, but my sense is that much of what individuals are asked to do is knowingly conservation theater. If you want to put a positive spin on that, you can say it makes them feel more committed to supporting the regulatory changes necessary by building a sense of shared sacrifice. The cynical version writes itself.

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

#517

Post by pas »

coliveira wrote: post #414
rich_sasha wrote: post #170

It’s just so hard to know what actions have what impact on CO2 production. Some are high-pain, low-gain (switching devices off instead of standby?), some are opposite (cycling instead of driving when possible etc). For that if for no other reason, I’d rather if consumer prices included an explicit CO2 tax. The here can be a rebate for poorer people, or personal allowance, whatever, but there would be a fixed yardstic…

The day true environmental costs are embedded in every item, is the day capitalism will come to an end. The nature of the system is to underpay for items that are not helping certain groups. Take just the example of food. 90+% of the price you pay go to middlemen. Real producers make close to nothing on each food item. But food contributes to a large percentage of global warming. Suddenly you will have to start payin…

And why would that make "capitalism" "come to an end"?

It opens up new niches for food production. Especially more capital intensive ways (eg vertical farming).

The trend of less and less people being employed in food production continues.

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

#518

Post by dTal »

endtime wrote: post #420
jsonne wrote: post #360

If there is anything covid has taught me its that collective action isn't something we can rely on and is a lot more wishful thinking about the state of humanity rather than a sober look at the reality. Governments need to tax CO2 emissions on the business side and pour the money into carbon capture technology in the private space through investment and perhaps some sort of bounty program (you get $x for each ton you…

Isn't it funny how COVID has caused the government-inclined to want more government and the government-disinclined to want less government? Almost as if this complex issue about which we still don't have all the facts has just made people feel that their prior beliefs have been confirmed? I wonder if there's a phrase for a bias like that.

Are you saying that Covid has had zero net effect on people's political inclinations? That the stark lesson in the importance of coordinated action has only hit home amongst those who were already "government inclined"? Because I don't that's true.

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

#519

Post by headmelted »

throwaway744678 wrote: post #446
headmelted wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. A 200% value-added tax on fossil fuels that rises by 10% every year would provide the capital. EDIT: To clarify, this is not a suggestion to raise capital from the tax as much as it's to raise capital from the use of fossil fuels. It's a suggestion for an increasingly punitive financial cost to force behavioural changes.

Wow, nice realistic solution! This will definitely not cause a major financial crisis. You should run for office.

I do see your point, and I've thought about this consequence a lot.

I sincerely don't think it would cause a financial collapse, as ridiculous as that might sound.

200% plus 10% compounding per annum is the lowest I think we could reasonably go in order to be in with a chance of reaching peak carbon by 2030.

It forces deeply painful changes on the world, but no more painful than is necessary to avoid the collapse of civilisation.

The problem until now is that people haven't been given the justification to go along with the astronomical task being asked (i.e. Stop burning fossil fuels immediately or we all die).

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

#520

Post by [deleted] »

lovemenot wrote: post #484
bko wrote: post #447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Believe it or not, western countries have reduced carbon emissions over the last ~15 years, in both absolute and per capita terms (despite a growing population). The only countries that are growing their carbon emissions are developing countries; mainly China, India and Russia. China is particularly troubling since they make up 28% of all emissions (US is 15%) and they have both a growing population and growing emiss…

>> The bad news is, they're China. Not sure what your point is here, but whatever it may be, I feel sure it is not helpful wrt to climate policy in the world's largest emitter. If you have some other axe to grind, maybe take it elsewhere. China is dominant in industries that are currently significant in renewables. Especially solar PV. They already have the largest EV fleet, including buses. The next industry to real…

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