Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says • Hacker News Board

Re: Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says

#11

Post by __natty__ » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 2:30 PM UTC

whatever1 wrote: post #5

Schiendelman wrote: post #4

There hasn't been a question about this in a decade or more. There was no path, even theoretically, to stopping our CO2 emissions without dramatically lowering quality of life for maybe a couple billion people. We won't slow climate change. We can build resilience to the effects, and we have good incentives to do so. But we'll keep burning fossil fuels for a very long time.

Maybe it will be a good incentive to rebuild our global infrastructure without having to go through a world war ?

Say this to global warlords not to random user on Hacker News

Re: Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says

#12

Post by what_hn » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 2:34 PM UTC

benfortuna wrote: post #7

Schiendelman wrote: post #4

There hasn't been a question about this in a decade or more. There was no path, even theoretically, to stopping our CO2 emissions without dramatically lowering quality of life for maybe a couple billion people. We won't slow climate change. We can build resilience to the effects, and we have good incentives to do so. But we'll keep burning fossil fuels for a very long time.

> We can build resilience to the effects Oh yeah, would love to see the resilience that would have prevented the Nepalese disaster

Yeah, not build in the lowest point where there is a glacier upstream

Re: Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says

#13

Post by ako » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 2:34 PM UTC

Schiendelman wrote: post #4

There hasn't been a question about this in a decade or more. There was no path, even theoretically, to stopping our CO2 emissions without dramatically lowering quality of life for maybe a couple billion people. We won't slow climate change. We can build resilience to the effects, and we have good incentives to do so. But we'll keep burning fossil fuels for a very long time.

Quality of life will be dramatically lower for many because we did not take action

Re: Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says

#14

Post by OgsyedIE » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 2:34 PM UTC

Supposing all anthropogenic emissions went to zero today, we'd still keep warming almost as far as three degrees with all of the disasters and famines that entails, because there's a lag time between existing emissions and their effects.

We need massive bounty programs that pay out irrespective of nationality for every possible kind of improvement and gain to carbon capture technology if we want to prevent 90% of all land on Earth between 30°N and 30°S from slowly turning into copies of the uninhabitable stretches of the Middle East.

Re: Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says

#15

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 2:35 PM UTC

jkahrs595 wrote: post #6

WarmWash wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Not much of a surprise. Government action has been anemic at best. Industry action (overall) has been net negative. And individual action has switched to just holding governments and industry responsible. Which basically amounts to giving up. "Welp, just gonna buy this truck, enjoy my burgers, set the AC at 68 and fly on all vacations this year because it's nothing compared to Big Oil."

Don’t forget eating meat, the easiest thing to stop doing (people needs cars and trucks for work, they don’t need cheeseburgers). People can’t be bothered to make any changes, it’s always someone else’s problem. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/27/meat-gas...

[deleted]

Re: Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says

#16

Post by ThrowawayIP » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 2:36 PM UTC

multiplegeorges wrote: post #2

Not much of a surprise. Government action has been anemic at best. Industry action (overall) has been net negative. The only hope now is exponential growth of (solar and wind)+batteries making other sources uneconomic. This seems to be slowly happening, so I hope we hit the exponential curve soon and we're there quicker than we expect. This only stops it. Then, to fix it, we'll need a massive Direct Air Capture indus…

The technology-will-save-us mentality is part of the reason we are here. We live in a society that doesn't do anything unless it makes money for some set of decrepit old men.

We had the means to avoid this (strict vegan diets, ground based mass transit, dense development & re-wilding, energy transition) but people made money doing the opposite. And more people made money sabotaging solar+battery pricing in the US.

So we get to watch the world burn down around us.

Re: Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says

#17

Post by benfortuna » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 2:38 PM UTC

jkahrs595 wrote: post #6

WarmWash wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Not much of a surprise. Government action has been anemic at best. Industry action (overall) has been net negative. And individual action has switched to just holding governments and industry responsible. Which basically amounts to giving up. "Welp, just gonna buy this truck, enjoy my burgers, set the AC at 68 and fly on all vacations this year because it's nothing compared to Big Oil."

Don’t forget eating meat, the easiest thing to stop doing (people needs cars and trucks for work, they don’t need cheeseburgers). People can’t be bothered to make any changes, it’s always someone else’s problem. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/27/meat-gas...

Even cutting back on meat can have an impact. Halving quantities in cooking etc. really is hardly noticeable.

Re: Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says

#18

Post by WarmWash » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 2:41 PM UTC

jkahrs595 wrote: post #6

WarmWash wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Not much of a surprise. Government action has been anemic at best. Industry action (overall) has been net negative. And individual action has switched to just holding governments and industry responsible. Which basically amounts to giving up. "Welp, just gonna buy this truck, enjoy my burgers, set the AC at 68 and fly on all vacations this year because it's nothing compared to Big Oil."

Don’t forget eating meat, the easiest thing to stop doing (people needs cars and trucks for work, they don’t need cheeseburgers). People can’t be bothered to make any changes, it’s always someone else’s problem. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/sep/27/meat-gas...

Yeah, good catch, thanks.

Re: Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says

#19

Post by nkohari » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 2:41 PM UTC

WarmWash wrote: post #3

multiplegeorges wrote: post #2

Not much of a surprise. Government action has been anemic at best. Industry action (overall) has been net negative. The only hope now is exponential growth of (solar and wind)+batteries making other sources uneconomic. This seems to be slowly happening, so I hope we hit the exponential curve soon and we're there quicker than we expect. This only stops it. Then, to fix it, we'll need a massive Direct Air Capture indus…

>Not much of a surprise. Government action has been anemic at best. Industry action (overall) has been net negative. And individual action has switched to just holding governments and industry responsible. Which basically amounts to giving up. "Welp, just gonna buy this truck, enjoy my burgers, set the AC at 68 and fly on all vacations this year because it's nothing compared to Big Oil."

Governments and industry are responsible. Personal consumption/waste is not the primary driver of climate change, no matter how much corporations tell us that using paper straws is the solution. It's tough to expect average people to take major action when corporations are essentially given carte blanche.

Re: Global warming will exceed 1.5-degree limit, UN says

#20

Post by baq » Sat, Sep 05, 2026, 2:41 PM UTC

ThrowawayIP wrote: post #16

multiplegeorges wrote: post #2

Not much of a surprise. Government action has been anemic at best. Industry action (overall) has been net negative. The only hope now is exponential growth of (solar and wind)+batteries making other sources uneconomic. This seems to be slowly happening, so I hope we hit the exponential curve soon and we're there quicker than we expect. This only stops it. Then, to fix it, we'll need a massive Direct Air Capture indus…

The technology-will-save-us mentality is part of the reason we are here. We live in a society that doesn't do anything unless it makes money for some set of decrepit old men. We had the means to avoid this (strict vegan diets, ground based mass transit, dense development & re-wilding, energy transition) but people made money doing the opposite. And more people made money sabotaging solar+battery pricing in the US. So…

Just like it isn’t possible to get politicians to stop spending other people’s money, it isn’t possible to stop enterprises from making as much money as possible while spending as little as possible on a global scale (it may work locally!)

Thus, technology-will-save-us is the rational choice. Drill all the oil, build the biggest datacenters and speedrun to fusion before the collapse so we can sequester the carbon back into the ground and still have energy left to run Haber-Bosch, ideally with hydrolysis instead of natgas.

Disclaimer: I used to be heavily in the sustainability camp in my younger years