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Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

bloomberg.com

141–150 of 322 posts

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#141
post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Climate related deaths have declined by 98% over the last century. You are 50x less likely to die of a climate-related cause than in 1920. 8x as many people die from cold temperatures as warm ones. The planet is more green today than a century ago. CO2 is plant food. We need more energy, not less. Renewable, nuclear, and yes even fossil fuels. It brings people out of poverty and increases standard of living. When hum…

These seem like ChatGPT’s response to the prompt “Give me a list of disingenuous points for dismissing anthropogenic climate change.”

I don't think they are dismissive points. I think specially the ending makes a whole lot of sense to me. I'd give negative shits about the environment if I struggled for food or housing or basic essentials.

The same way the best way to tackle crime is through better education for the people, getting the existing people out of poverty might be the single best thing we can do to have them realize the impact, reproduce less, and contribute to a solution. I also think this way ends up being pragmatic because it doesn't require "so we change everyone's minds" as step 1.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#142
post #7

It makes a ton of sense if your focus is only short-term profit. It makes absolutely 0 sense if your goal is to try to decrease the legal liability of knowingly causing global warming and actively suppressing those internal studies to increase profits. Feels like the oil companies are going to face a big tobacco moment in the next 20 years and the previous CEO was preparing their defense of "don't punish us for the s…

I guess I don't see what other option we have other than drill baby drill. Yes we're killing our planet but renewable aren't able to provide the energy we need at scale. Switching to 100% renewables and not drilling means increased oil prices and ultimately less consumption across the board. Less food, less driving, less heat, less AC. We'd all have to give up a lot and no one is signing up for that. There's this mag…

why can't we do nuclear with plugin hybrids in urban areas. the federal government , which, as an issuer of money, can afford anything, unlike states/municipalities, should massively fund nuclear to save the environment meet energy demands. seems like such a no-brainer.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#143
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some 40% of the population is actively pro big oil and actively denies the carbon footprint causal links with climate change and warming. You think 20 years is enough for this reckoning? Honestly, I think they’re all going to get away with it with zero repercussion. If humanity is still around in a couple hundred years, there might be retroactive virtue signalling. But that doesn’t matter cause everyone responsible w…

Is it still 40 percent? Seems much more evident now what's happening. Maybe 40 percent is still pro big oil but they don't deny the causal link. I'm pro big oil because I still drive a gas car. In that sense if you use big oil products you are a supporter. I would put supporters at over waaaaay over 40 percent. 95% is a better estimate.

That’s a weird way to put it. Driving a gas car doesn’t make you pro-big oil. Most of us are beholden to market pressures and have no realistic option.

Everyone still has to make their living, and they have to do it inside the elites construction of the market.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#144
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we'll never stop extracting oil in the foreseeable future, we'll just be doing a lot less of it. There will always be corner cases where diesel or other oil derivatives (or NG) are the /only/ reasonable option for fuel. Think generators for an antarctic station that can only use solar in certain months and wind isn't enough (or reliable enough)). Even if efficient electric commercial aviation at scale ever ha…

Electricity is probably going to be an order of magnitude (or more) cheaper in 20 years, at least for bulk purchase in most fixed locations (not Antarctic winter.) The assumption that oil extraction is worthwhile is based on it being the cheapest way to get a unit of power. But if power is 1/10th what it costs now it is economical to do some process that has absurdly bad efficiency (10:1, even 100:1) to translate pow…

How do you see electricity getting 10x cheaper in 20 years? It sounds like people saying fission electricity would be too cheap to meter, and yet its some of the most expensive electricity we have in the US.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is true that the people demanded the lifestyle provided by fossil fuel emissions. But corporations didn't just say "oh if you insist." When new policies and regulations are attempted that will not affect the lifestyle of the people but will eat into corporate profits, they fight tooth and nail. An honest corporation that was just acting to serve the needs of the people wouldn't do something like fight to reduce th…

I think we've KNOWN what this shit does to the air and water for at least, what 40 years? At what point do we blame ourselves to increasing fossil fuel usage, even in the what, past 5 years?

> we blame ourselves

So I buy shrimp that was grown locally.

Then I read up that shrimps were transported to the other side of the world, peeled there, and shipped back, travelled 20,000 miles, before landong on my plate.

I buy canned pairs, and turns out the same story. What am I suppose to do, starve?

The capitalist machine prioritises fictitious resource of money, over real resource of oil. It wastes huge amount of enegy just to take advantage of a poor country's low wages.

I drive an ebike to work. You can go vegan, quit heating your house, take cold showers, none of it will make any difference if the industry does not change it's practices.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#146
post #134
post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Climate related deaths have declined by 98% over the last century. You are 50x less likely to die of a climate-related cause than in 1920. 8x as many people die from cold temperatures as warm ones. The planet is more green today than a century ago. CO2 is plant food. We need more energy, not less. Renewable, nuclear, and yes even fossil fuels. It brings people out of poverty and increases standard of living. When hum…

>Climate related deaths have declined by 98% over the last century. Wow, HVAC is an amazing technology.

Yes, thanks HVAC and all of the energy sources that produce the equipment and then power it.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Global hydrocarbon consumption is down on a per capita basis. And that's despite the fact that renewable energy and electric vehicles had a negligible share. It's only the last year or two that renewable energy's share has become non-negligible. The EV transition is lagging the renewable energy transition, but it's happening too. EV's now have a non-negligible share of new vehicle sales, but since it takes ~20 years…

The EV crutch is getting really old. With current tech it is not a solution. Not even remotely. It's great. I love the idea too. I would rather we stop driving around machines that belch out dangerous toxins but a mass migration to EVs will be disastrous. The manufacturers are going hybrid...which is a sensible transition. It should get people used to the freedom of producing/collecting their own energy. Hopefully th…

How are hybrids a sensible solution?

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#148
post #7

It makes a ton of sense if your focus is only short-term profit. It makes absolutely 0 sense if your goal is to try to decrease the legal liability of knowingly causing global warming and actively suppressing those internal studies to increase profits. Feels like the oil companies are going to face a big tobacco moment in the next 20 years and the previous CEO was preparing their defense of "don't punish us for the s…

I guess I don't see what other option we have other than drill baby drill. Yes we're killing our planet but renewable aren't able to provide the energy we need at scale. Switching to 100% renewables and not drilling means increased oil prices and ultimately less consumption across the board. Less food, less driving, less heat, less AC. We'd all have to give up a lot and no one is signing up for that. There's this mag…

All of these changes that seem impossible that are routine when there is a large scale war on - production shifts + consumption is restricted.

The difference is that an existential climate crisis it just isn't treated by our leaders with the same importance as a good old fashioned war.

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Global hydrocarbon consumption is down on a per capita basis. And that's despite the fact that renewable energy and electric vehicles had a negligible share. It's only the last year or two that renewable energy's share has become non-negligible. The EV transition is lagging the renewable energy transition, but it's happening too. EV's now have a non-negligible share of new vehicle sales, but since it takes ~20 years…

> EV's now have a non-negligible share of new vehicle sales, In only a few third world countries.

In Norway, about 90% of new sales are EVs. They aren't a third world country.

https://insideevs.com/news/675163/norway-plugin-car-sales-ju...

The USA was at 14% last year and could hit 18% this year.

https://insideevs.com/news/675163/norway-plugin-car-sales-ju...

Re: Shell abandons its plan to offset CO2 emissions

#150

The plan that was shelved was about carbon offsets, these have not proven to be particularly effective so maybe not too big a deal. The greater loss is that the new CEO had already scaled down Shell's investment in renewables, setting a target of 4.5% of the total investments in renewables by 2025[0]. Some other Oil&Gas companies seem to be a bit more inclined to actually invest in renewables, or at least pay lip ser…

If there are x offsets available, and demand is x + 100, then when Shell buys offsets, they're not really fixing the problem at all, they're just shifting blame right? They're saying "since we spent this money on the offsets, our carbon emissions were good (or at least 'less bad'), but the other company that couldn't afford or wouldn't bother with the offsets is bad even though there were only enough offsets for one…

Buying offsets is not shifting the blame, it's paying someone else to fix the problem. The reason for that should be that you either have no cost effective way to offset the carbon yourself, or there is a very attractive market for the offsets.

If demand were x+100, and theoretically some company wouldn't be able to afford to buy the offsets, it wouldn't somehow have ended up with the blame of Shell, they would just have found no one to solve their problem for them and would have to fix it themselves.

Of course this is assuming that whoever is selling the offsets is actually performing the task of carbon offsetting effectively, something that many believe is not actually happening so that puts things into even more murky waters.

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