Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth • Hacker News Board

Re: Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth

#311

Post by hackerlight » Tue, Apr 25, 2023, 10:00 PM UTC

teawrecks wrote: post #117

hannob wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we can't reach 1.5°C then we should try to reach 1.6°C. If we can't reach that then 1.7°C. Ultimately: It doesn't matter whether we can reach 1.5°C, because everything we try helps making things better. And any carbon sequestation technology will only help significantly after drastic emission cuts, not as a replacement for it.: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00953-x

If we're already going to have to heavily adapt our living arrangements to account for extreme climate change, at what point does 0.1° not matter? 5.0° vs 5.1°? 10.0° vs 10.1°?

Learn the concept of marginality. Things get progressively worse. Reality is usually not a binary switch.

Re: Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth

#312

Post by mnky9800n » Tue, Apr 25, 2023, 10:02 PM UTC

Dah00n wrote: post #297

mnky9800n wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a third of the co2 produced comes from electricity. Rich nations could subsidize GDP growth in developing nations by building nuclear and renewables there. These countries will accelerate the demise of humanity if they burn coal instead. They don't have the right to do it. Neither did developed nations but they already did it. We do not have the right to determine the fate of the planet that we share with all other l…

>They don't have the right to do it. Well, if they say they have the right then they have the right. They are, after all, as free to govern themselves as we are. If you mean ethics doesn't allow them, sure, but the same ethics doesn't allow us to let them pay for the damage we did and especially since much of their pollution is actually them producing stuff for us. Chinese made pollution creating stuff for Americans…

Yes I completely agree with you. The only question is how to implement that today and not need another 27 cop meetings, etc. To discuss solutions.

Re: Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth

#313

Post by reisse » Tue, Apr 25, 2023, 10:05 PM UTC

908B64B197 wrote: post #270

intrasight wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A recent piece in The Economist argued that China is doing more to combat global warming than is any other nation, and if America is going to do better then we'll have to become more like China. I agree on both points. And I think that will be the outcome eventually.

> China is doing more to combat global warming than is any other nation What? The west is working hard at lowering it's emissions, but all that work is getting undone because China's emissions aren't slowing down. Coal is incredibly cheap when there's no carbon tax or emission standards. One of the many reasons it's cheaper to manufacture in China and why North Americans and Europeans can't compete [0]. Comparing the…

Your comparison between China and US from 1973 to now is fundamentally wrong. In 1970s, US already was a developed country, while China was barely rising from poverty.

It's unfair when the western countries demand lowering emissions from the third world. West was able to enjoy unlimited carbon emissions for years, while the third world was mostly agricultural and had poorly developed economies. Now, when other countries undergo the same economic transformations US had long time ago, Americans demand them to ditch progress for the sake of preventing climate change. And that's while outsourcing "dirty" manufacturing and waste management to the same third world countries.

Re: Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth

#314

Post by mnky9800n » Tue, Apr 25, 2023, 10:08 PM UTC

slothtrop wrote: post #276

mnky9800n wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a third of the co2 produced comes from electricity. Rich nations could subsidize GDP growth in developing nations by building nuclear and renewables there. These countries will accelerate the demise of humanity if they burn coal instead. They don't have the right to do it. Neither did developed nations but they already did it. We do not have the right to determine the fate of the planet that we share with all other l…

Worth reminding that the IPCC stance is not apocalyptic, in contrast to what you seem to suggest. Rich countries are scarcely getting back around to upscaling nuclear themselves, much less subsidizing it in others. One advantage the developing countries have is they don't have the baggage of existing extensive infrastructure for electricity, and some renewables can be deployed in a more decentralized fashion (i.e. so…

This isn't limited to a couple degrees of temperature. We are killing the planet with the current mass extinction event. We don't have the right to do that.

But I agree with you which is why I devote my time to research related to climate mitigation topics such as co2 sequestration.

Re: Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth

#315

Post by hackerlight » Tue, Apr 25, 2023, 10:09 PM UTC

Xeamek wrote: post #301

mnky9800n wrote: post #239

climate change isn't a problem of science it is a problem of oppression. It is an unjust decision by the power elites to continue the status quo while hoping some silly valley hoohaw is going to come up with a silver bullet but if not who cares, got mine. It is about stealing from present and future generations. It is about stealing from the poor, people of color who will be displaced by rising sea levels. It is abou…

Extremely reductive take, to the point of naivety.

How is it reductive? Literally speaking, climate change will most impact the people who benefited the least from the burning of fossil fuels. Those are the people who come from poor and hot countries in the global south and near the equator, who have historically burned far less fossil fuels per-capita, but nevertheless will be harmed the most per-capita given their climates are already precarious. Then, when the consequences boil over in a few decades and their countries become too hot to be healthily habitable, they will be banned from migrating to colder, richer countries by those countries' local conservatives, who will lobby government to restrict or ban immigration intake. What a sick and hypocritical situation that will be. Those rich and cold countries' wealth was generated by the fossil fuels that were burned that put those poor people in the global south in that awful predicament to begin with, and now they'll be stuck there to deal with the consequences that they didn't primarily create. It's a world-scale theft of opportunity, wealth and life.

Re: Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth

#316

Post by amrocha » Tue, Apr 25, 2023, 10:11 PM UTC

admax88qqq wrote: post #188

amrocha wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can't stop climate change by making it profitable. That's literally what got us into this mess in the first place.

I think that's the only way we can stop it. If we make reducing emissions profitable our existing system will do it. The other alternative is to completely rebuild our political/social system around something other than profit. Good luck with that, that's a fools errand.

When you put it like that it sounds really difficult, but what exactly would it mean to "completely rebuild"?

IMO it could look something like this:

- Governments around the world set up a Climate Change Council

- The council is given power to regulate industry, and assign national resources

- High impact industry is shut down or refactored. For example, coal should be banned, but oil companies should be nationalized and fazed out while alternatives are built

That's pretty much it. It's hard, and it's a large effort over a long period of time, but there's nothing impossible about it. We don't have to reimagine society to do it.

Re: Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth

#317

Post by syntheweave » Tue, Apr 25, 2023, 10:12 PM UTC

scythe wrote: post #175

input_sh wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd add that all our models include some form of carbon removal, which is still within the realm of fiction in any meaningful capacity. So not only do our children inherit the mess, but our most optimistic scenarios all include our children being the ones to invent some sort of miracle tech. Meanwhile we're mostly sitting on our asses and not even a global pandemic could convince us to make any sort of meaningful cha…

I don't think it makes a lot of sense that COVID would have caused some kind of climate revolution. If anything, it made in-person physical work — necessary to build sustainable infrastructure — more difficult. As it stands, global PV installed capacity has been growing by a pretty constant 20% per annum for the last five years, about half of which is in China and Europe but with similar exponential rates in other co…

The COVID effect was mostly one of trend accelerations: more people using online services for everything, delivery for everything. It produced a shock that is currently changing our infrastructure patterns.

We learned relatively quickly that although the streets cleared out, our energy use stayed roughly similar overall, and the supply shocks are tied to that story by shifting demand for goods and services in a relatively short period.

Back-to-office is also part of that because one of the goods and services that could not move that quickly is real estate: individuals could move, but businesses had leases. And everyone looking at the commercial real estate market has been shaking their heads and seeing a negative trend: yes, companies did mobilize to get people back on their office commute, but the market is still sliding and cities are looking at the difficult prospect of converting commercial buildings to housing now.

Re: Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth

#318

Post by amrocha » Tue, Apr 25, 2023, 10:15 PM UTC

conradkay wrote: post #183

amrocha wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can't stop climate change by making it profitable. That's literally what got us into this mess in the first place.

If economic forces are powerful enough to cause climate change it seems reasonable to use another economic force to revert/cancel that out.

You can't always fight fire with fire though

Re: Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth

#319

Post by hackerlight » Tue, Apr 25, 2023, 10:16 PM UTC

nxm wrote: post #24

ahelwer wrote: post #9

One eye-opening fact I recently learned is that fossil fuel infrastructure being built today is expected to have a three-decade lifespan, after completion of its construction. So every time you hear about a new pipeline, drilling project, or refinery being built you know that the people sitting in the rooms authorizing billions of dollars being allocated to the project all believe it will safely be operating and prod…

And where are those being built? Overwhelmingly in Asia and Africa

And they still burn much less per-capita, so what's your point? Everyone should decarbonize quickly, but especially those wealthy countries that burn the most per-capita today, and who have burned the most historically and therefore benefited the most from the resulting wealth accumulation. And these wealthy countries should be sending truckloads of money to poor countries to help them with their decarbonization efforts, as recompense for their far outsized role in creating this problem to begin with.

Re: Shell admits 1.5C climate goal means immediate end to fossil fuel growth

#320

Post by qqqwerty » Tue, Apr 25, 2023, 10:32 PM UTC

nradov wrote: post #302

qqqwerty wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am all for nuclear as part of the energy mix, but the amount of FUD being spread by pro-nuclear bros really makes it hard to get on board. > we really don't know what else would We absolutely can meet our needs with other clean energy sources. And unlike nuclear most of these technologies are cost competitive with fossil fuels currently, and the ones that are not are continuing to come down in costs as manufacturin…

That is misinformation. We absolutely cannot meet our needs with other clean energy sources until we figure out how to deliver reliable, economical base load power. There are a variety of proposals for grid scale energy storage but so far none have been proven to work at scale . We certainly can't build enough batteries to keep industrial customers running through several days of minimal sunshine and wind. So the rea…

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