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WA, NY and CA Governors Announce Formation of United States Climate Alliance

governor.wa.gov

381–390 of 412 posts

Re: WA, NY and CA Governors Announce Formation of United States Climate Alliance

#381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2. I'm pretty sure not having oceanic level rise, and drowning out the most expensive real state in the world is a benefit to us! The notion that somehow the developed world gives $100b (over what time frame? That matters a lot) and gets nothing in return is ridiculous. Manufacturing clean energy stuff is not within grasp of most developing countries. So they have to import tools, expertise and goods... from where? 3…

2. They are not importing tools and expertise, they are have the tools and expertise and they are not only deploying it locally they are exporting it to America. If you want to see some a benefit then write the mandate that American companies must be used to provide the clean energy capabilities to the developing countries. Not only would that be rejected it would be a bad idea for many reasons, but the opposite is d…

Re. 2: Most of the aid funds are actually transferred in the form of subsidies to deals with companies from the "giving" country. For example, India is massively expanding its solar energy capacities. This is happening partly as a deal with German companies and the German government, which subsidizes the whole trade. That way India gets cheap solar energy infrastructure and Germany supports its solar energy industry.

I honestly don't know if this is happening in the same way with American companies, but to be honest, if it's not that would make me want to take a hard look at the reasons for it. Lack of effort from the government to make those deals, or inability to make attractive deals - which would be a rather worrying indicator of the american industry's health.

By completely exiting, Trump is effectively leaving the field of renewable energies to other countries. By relying more on burning fossil fuels for energy he can definitely give America a short term boost by preventing energy costs from rising further, but he might also cripple its renewable energy industry - which employs more US citizens than Oil, Coal and Gas combined.

Trump wouldn't have had to exit the agreement to do what he wants by the way - the agreement does not have any penalties for not fulfilling it, and it allows every country to adjust its own goals in the agreement, without asking anyone else for permission.

Re: WA, NY and CA Governors Announce Formation of United States Climate Alliance

#382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If these are the best replies to Trump's remarks, I very sadly must agree with Trump. Extremely disappointing.

While they seem like decent replies to me, there is no reason to think that you'd get the best replies to a complicated policy question from a random commenter in a forum for technology entrepreneurs.

Which is why I said "if these are the best replies".

Re: WA, NY and CA Governors Announce Formation of United States Climate Alliance

#383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If these are the best replies to Trump's remarks, I very sadly must agree with Trump. Extremely disappointing.

You've picked one single response that you don't like. Please read the rest in this thread, and then find a better source because there's no reason to think HN commenters are particularly expert in this area.

This was the top-voted response to the top-voted comment when I posted.

Re: WA, NY and CA Governors Announce Formation of United States Climate Alliance

#386
Most of those countries that would grandstand in front of the public and say they would sign a climate change agreement are full of it!!! If they won't step up and pay their fair share in NATO obligations to defend their own people, how are you going to trust them to abide by some little climate change agreement??? It's a bad deal! Trump was right. It's just another way to get America to pay for most of it! Bravo Zulu Trump!

Re: WA, NY and CA Governors Announce Formation of United States Climate Alliance

#388
post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worth noting that we can't even really leave the Accord until 2020, so there's a lot of political posturing involved here. This was all debated for years, so none of this should come as a surprise to anyone. We went into this eyes WIDE open. China got a good deal, yeah, because it had leverage: it's the manufacturing capitol of the world. It could very easily have walked away with no commitments at all. As for develo…

We supposedly can't leave until 2020, but who would enforce that? There is also the option of staying, but reporting our carbon emissions with alternative facts. Done to an extreme, that means we get the payments.

What you describe is what everyone is doing anyways. My country, Canada, is "in" the agreement but mere weeks after signing approved a controversial liquid natural gas project in B.C. that just by itself would blow away our ability to meet the Paris agreement commitments completely.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/lng-petronas-...

Re: WA, NY and CA Governors Announce Formation of United States Climate Alliance

#389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given we can't actually leave the accord until 2020, Trump's whole speech is nothing but signaling.

This was not a treaty ratified by the senate so it's not legally binding in any way.

So then, "leaving" it nothing but signaling.

Re: WA, NY and CA Governors Announce Formation of United States Climate Alliance

#390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Poor countries are allowed to increase their carbon emissions because their current emissions are already low per person, and requiring then to lower emissions would basically be telling then they're not allowed to become developed countries. They will not sign on. 2. We're paying poor countries to mitigate these effects, by subsidizing their use of cleaner energy to industrialize. And to compensate them, since th…

"requiring then to lower emissions would basically be telling then they're not allowed to become developed countries" It sounds to me like the effort needs to be in making green energy more affordable than non-green energy. This would benefit all nations. Money talks. If it's cheaper to go green, even the most die-hard conservative will go green (anecdotal case in point: my die-hard conservative grandfather, who driv…

And that's exactly what that big chunk of cash is supposed to be for - to help developing nations start out with cleaner power generation.
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