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

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651–660 of 1001 posts

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

#651
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…

> 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. USA: 15.50 metric tons (2016) India: 1.82 metric tons (2016) Source: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.ATM.CO2E.PC?location... One Am…

> One American is emitting 15 Indians worth of carbon emissions.

15.5 / 1.82 = 8.5

So more like One American is emitting 9 Indian's worth of carbon emissions.

Still a lot though.

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

#652
post #70

So now we can get rid of fast fashion, mandate reusability for products, reintroduce basic woodworking, metalcrafting and sewing/repair work in school and with that get rid of a huge chunk of the needless shipping? Or are we still going to go after individuals eating traditional food while thought leaders fly across the globe in private jets (no kidding) telling us we need to change our diet? PS: I'm already a enthus…

Individual action won’t solve this problem. We need to leave the fossil fuels in the ground, which means switching energy sources, which is not something individuals have much influence on. Reducing energy use at the individual level is good, but insufficient if the energy used comes from fossil fuels. I’m not sure we need to switch lifestyles that much, but we will need to radically change energy production. There h…

> Individual action won’t solve this problem

This is true. But if large portions of the electorate start living like GP, they'll have no problem with voting for carbon taxes and other measures that'll cost money. They won't be swayed by talking heads on TV shouting "environmental Marxism!".

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

#653

No, it's not. https://twitter.com/RogerPielkeJr/status/1424712163281694725 This is more media fearmongering. Edit: Threadreader link https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1424712163281694725.html

I don't understand any of that. Any chance of an acronym dictionary for us laymen?

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

#654
post #423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if a country doesn't, are we willing/able to go to war? Given that some countries will burn down forests that pollute their airspace, and the airspace of their neighbours it's pretty likely there will be those that refuse the tax.

You smack import taxes on them that correspond to the carbon tax that should have been + 10%. Then they can either do the carbon tax or have their exports made much, much more expensive.

If you can smack a tax on their imports, why not already do it? This only works if you are a union/trading-block/superpower with the leverage to do so - and as the world gets globally competitive morally punishing taxes will require more and more "fighting the invisible hand" i.e working against the interests of free trade.

To re-iterate the point that probably got my original post downvoted: It helps to have a large military-industrial complex to enforce embargos.

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

#655
post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if a country doesn't, are we willing/able to go to war? Given that some countries will burn down forests that pollute their airspace, and the airspace of their neighbours it's pretty likely there will be those that refuse the tax.

Maybe not straight to war, but taxing cross border trade, embargo, etc. are all effective.

That was always the assumption. How effective was/is it against China? There's an "tragedy of the commons" wrt international trade.

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

#656
post #543
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…

> Governments need to tax CO2 emissions on the business side Europe is so taxed I can't even fart without paying to the government. Don't get me wrong, I get a lot for what I pay, but it's borderline too much.

Tough luck everyone, OP said he already pays too many taxes, so unfortunately climate action has to go on the back burner. But good news, at least while we are still alive he won’t feel like the government is taking took much.

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

#657
post #464
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…

China is less troubling than US if you look at per capita numbers: US 15.52, China 7.38 tons of CO2

The US produces much more economic output per ton of CO2 created than China. Carbon efficiency of economic output is a key metric that we should be optimizing for. This allows us to grow the economy on a per capita basis while still reducing absolute carbon emissions.

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

#658
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…

Seeing the Apple thing and the Australis thing and the EU thing, I'm happy humanity will kill itself by Climate Change.

We have built systems that make it impossible for evil to fail, it will always succeed. You can see it popping up everywhere - loss of privacy, climate change denialism, covid denialism, fascism everywhere, chinese extermination camps, ...

We will all die out and it is a good thing. We will all suffer terribly and that's good, we deserve that too.

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

#659
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…

> I'm past hoping for people to do the right things en masse. Getting people behind goals with long timelines is pretty much impossible. As you said, the pandemic demonstrated (and continues to demonstrate) how we behave and think. > Governments need to tax CO2 emissions on the business side and pour the money into carbon capture technology No. Sorry. You are buying into propaganda. Put simply: We (humanity) cannot d…

This is a really poor take. At no point in our history is there anything approaching a sudden cessation of human industry and activity that is core to your thought experiment. You are comparing geologic, astronomical, and evolutionary changes that are incredibly gradual for the most part when compared to human activity. By using your exact same logic I can easily "prove" that the massive increase in CO2 that has happened in the past 150 years is impossible.

Your analogy is exactly like saying that since the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_Tunnel_State_Park took a million years to form, it's impossible for humanity to create 1000 foot tunnel in less than a million years.

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

#660
The only way to stop this catastrophe is global population reduction and consumption limitations.

Nothing so far. No effort by anyone has flattened the curve. CO2, CH4, SF6, and N20 are all consistently growing linearly with human consumption. https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends/

We have to do everything possible to flatten the curve and that will take sacrifice and changes today.

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