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You can do a lot in your own life that will also save you money. I won't go into too much detail because, as you note, this has a small effect unless lots of pe

You can do a lot in your own life that will also save you money. I won't go into too much detail because, as you note, this has a small effect unless lots of people do it. But some simple ideas that are cheap and boring. - Eat less meat or cut it out fully (or at least not every day) - Fly less and use long distance trains where you can - Insulate your property to reduce energy use - Ride a bicycle and take public transport rather than drive (or get an EV) - Install solar power / battery storage / heat pumps - Switch energy supplier to a green provider However, to be effective beyond that you need to do things that scale and have a multiplying effect or bootstrap/kickstart a virtuous circle. This should be a familiar principle for the startup crowd on HN. Some simple ideas: - Write about your experiences in green living online - Get a job in a green industry (lots of them need developers) - Help others get jobs in green industries - Invest in green companies (crowd funding etc.) - Divest from fossil fuel (pension choices etc.) - Join a community group and donate your time / skills For example, I help run a community group called Cleanweb UK and we have a free jobs site (https://cleanwebjobs.com https://cleanwebjobs.com) that tries to get tech workers into jobs that help fight climate change. Friends of the Earth often run hackathons. You could also make tools to help people who are trying to reduce their carbon impact. For example, I built https://shutdownscanner.com https://shutdownscanner.com to help office managers measure how many computers are left on when not in use. There are many opportunities to build tools that assist in demand shifting and other green data based systems.

Declanomous 10y ago
As far as I'm aware flying generates fewer greenhouse gas emissions than any either trains, cars or buses over long distances. (At least in the US, where our rail infrastructure is freight-centric and diesel powered.) The argument against flying is that the greenhouse gas emissions end up high up, which could contribute to the greenhouse gas effect. However, long distance passenger trains in the US reduce the freight capacity of railroads, and the railroad is vastly more efficient than tractor-trailers when it comes to freight transport. This holds true even if the freight is transported in the relatively-un-aerodynamic intermodal container.
- hiou 10y ago
  A solo ride in a car could be worse than a full plane on a cross country trip. But a train or bus is typically(there may be some edge cases) going to be much better than an airplane. Also, long distance passenger trains absolutely do not reduce freight transport. They lease the the use of the tracks which provides additional income to the freight carriers and the freight carriers have right of way at all times on the tracks. On top of that the Northeast Coast(Washington, DC and north) lines in the US are electric. Did you just randomly make this stuff up? It is completely false information.
  - Declanomous 10y ago
    >Did you just randomly make this stuff up? It is completely false information. You are the one who is misinformed. Railroad operators are required to give access to Amtrak as part of a deal that allowed them to cancel long-distance passenger service. They would much rather not give access to Amtrak in the first place. Furthermore Amtrak is supposed to have priority over freight trains, however Amtrak is at the mercy of the dispatchers of the railroad whose lines they are travelling over. The Northeast corridor is completely owned by Amtrak. Outside of that area, there are no electrified long distance passenger services in the United States. Outside of the Northeast corridor, flying is a much greener option than taking a train.
    - hiou 10y ago
      > The Northeast corridor is completely owned by Amtrak. To quote the Boston Globe "Under an agreement signed in 2003, Amtrak has used, maintained, and dispatched trains on the Attleboro line — the MBTA tracks between Boston and the Rhode Island line — for free."[0] [0] https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/04/18/mbta-seek-penalties-against-amtrak-new-contract-for-commuter-rail-disruptions/QdDlwOo5DfRHPxBWsdW8OO/story.html https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/04/18/mbta-seek-penal... Seriously, stop it. You are just making stuff up. Why are you doing that?
      - Declanomous 10y ago
yourapostasy 10y ago
> - Insulate your property to reduce energy use I'm evaluating how to improve this small, isolated facet. Foamed glass blocks and sheets are really great insulation, but are currently prohibitively expensive for working and middle class to acquire in massive quantities (sufficient to reach and even exceed PassivHaus standards). However, if one is willing to accept lower efficiency end-product (made up for with thicker walls), extremely long, labor-intensive manufacturing times, and gradually add to insulation over years, it looks like it is feasible to build a backyard concentrated solar power kiln (only about 1,300 degrees C required, so not too many heliostats) and make one's own foamed glass insulation. A minor benefit is the process requires a small amount of carbon, so while coal dust is usually specified, it might be possible to turn this process into a very minor carbon sink using other sources of solar-thermal-powered manufactured carbon. You also need a machine that crushes glass into chunks, and can also crush into a powdery form called cullet. Make those solar electric-powered, and you have a process that can easily last a generation or two, making highly useful insulation the entire time there is plentiful sunshine out of your neighborhood's glass waste stream. Aesthetically though, this kind of insulating is a difficult sell to mainstream developed world sensibilities: you need 2-3 feet thick walls and ceilings filled with this insulation, and about 10 feet in the sub-slab or pier foundation, to reach the American equivalent of R-90 all-around, for example. PassivHaus requires a lot less, but they are evaluating on net economic benefit across 30 years max while I don't mind a multi-generation payback if the result is an energy footprint that is in the single digit percentages of even "green" houses today.
vkou 10y ago
This is like saying that you can help avoid another financial meltdown like 2008 by not taking out mortgages on homes you can't afford... And by divesting from AIG. While in some sense, this is technically correct, it does not actually address the problem. Much as with the financial crisis, what we have here is a case of the 80/20 rule - or rather, the 99.99980/0.00020 rule. 0.00020% of the people have almost all the power to combat global warming. (They aren't using it.)

Declanomous 10y ago

As far as I'm aware flying generates fewer greenhouse gas emissions than any either trains, cars or buses over long distances. (At least in the US, where our rail infrastructure is freight-centric and diesel powered.) The argument against flying is that the greenhouse gas emissions end up high up, which could contribute to the greenhouse gas effect. However, long distance passenger trains in the US reduce the freight capacity of railroads, and the railroad is vastly more efficient than tractor-trailers when it comes to freight transport. This holds true even if the freight is transported in the relatively-un-aerodynamic intermodal container.

hiou 10y ago
A solo ride in a car could be worse than a full plane on a cross country trip. But a train or bus is typically(there may be some edge cases) going to be much better than an airplane. Also, long distance passenger trains absolutely do not reduce freight transport. They lease the the use of the tracks which provides additional income to the freight carriers and the freight carriers have right of way at all times on the tracks. On top of that the Northeast Coast(Washington, DC and north) lines in the US are electric. Did you just randomly make this stuff up? It is completely false information.
- Declanomous 10y ago
  >Did you just randomly make this stuff up? It is completely false information. You are the one who is misinformed. Railroad operators are required to give access to Amtrak as part of a deal that allowed them to cancel long-distance passenger service. They would much rather not give access to Amtrak in the first place. Furthermore Amtrak is supposed to have priority over freight trains, however Amtrak is at the mercy of the dispatchers of the railroad whose lines they are travelling over. The Northeast corridor is completely owned by Amtrak. Outside of that area, there are no electrified long distance passenger services in the United States. Outside of the Northeast corridor, flying is a much greener option than taking a train.
  - hiou 10y ago
    > The Northeast corridor is completely owned by Amtrak. To quote the Boston Globe "Under an agreement signed in 2003, Amtrak has used, maintained, and dispatched trains on the Attleboro line — the MBTA tracks between Boston and the Rhode Island line — for free."[0] [0] https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/04/18/mbta-seek-penalties-against-amtrak-new-contract-for-commuter-rail-disruptions/QdDlwOo5DfRHPxBWsdW8OO/story.html https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/04/18/mbta-seek-penal... Seriously, stop it. You are just making stuff up. Why are you doing that?
    - Declanomous 10y ago

yourapostasy 10y ago

> - Insulate your property to reduce energy use I'm evaluating how to improve this small, isolated facet. Foamed glass blocks and sheets are really great insulation, but are currently prohibitively expensive for working and middle class to acquire in massive quantities (sufficient to reach and even exceed PassivHaus standards). However, if one is willing to accept lower efficiency end-product (made up for with thicker walls), extremely long, labor-intensive manufacturing times, and gradually add to insulation over years, it looks like it is feasible to build a backyard concentrated solar power kiln (only about 1,300 degrees C required, so not too many heliostats) and make one's own foamed glass insulation. A minor benefit is the process requires a small amount of carbon, so while coal dust is usually specified, it might be possible to turn this process into a very minor carbon sink using other sources of solar-thermal-powered manufactured carbon. You also need a machine that crushes glass into chunks, and can also crush into a powdery form called cullet. Make those solar electric-powered, and you have a process that can easily last a generation or two, making highly useful insulation the entire time there is plentiful sunshine out of your neighborhood's glass waste stream. Aesthetically though, this kind of insulating is a difficult sell to mainstream developed world sensibilities: you need 2-3 feet thick walls and ceilings filled with this insulation, and about 10 feet in the sub-slab or pier foundation, to reach the American equivalent of R-90 all-around, for example. PassivHaus requires a lot less, but they are evaluating on net economic benefit across 30 years max while I don't mind a multi-generation payback if the result is an energy footprint that is in the single digit percentages of even "green" houses today.

vkou 10y ago

This is like saying that you can help avoid another financial meltdown like 2008 by not taking out mortgages on homes you can't afford... And by divesting from AIG. While in some sense, this is technically correct, it does not actually address the problem. Much as with the financial crisis, what we have here is a case of the 80/20 rule - or rather, the 99.99980/0.00020 rule. 0.00020% of the people have almost all the power to combat global warming. (They aren't using it.)