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Do you imagine a future where not lighting up the Eiffel Tower has saved us from climate change? More generally, these "solutions" don't work. Billions of peop

by sambe 10y ago

Do you imagine a future where not lighting up the Eiffel Tower has saved us from climate change? More generally, these "solutions" don't work. Billions of people don't suddenly all agree to reduce their quality of life voluntarily. For every energy efficient lightbulb there's some beef they aren't supposed to eat, or a standby device that uses 2W too much power they have to switch off and on 5 times a day. It's never happened before and it won't happen for this, even if the world goes to crap due to climate change. Maybe stop wasting resources on feeling good about optimising the uncommon case and work on systematic stuff like clean power.

Brakenshire 10y ago
> It's never happened before and it won't happen for this It has happened that economic growth has untethered itself from fossil fuel growth almost everywhere in the Western world. I think consumer pressure can do something, apart from anything people just using it as an excuse to save money will do something. I agree that most of it has to be systemic, but there's a combination there. You need for instance cheaper storage and solar, more efficient a.c., better insulation, and so on, but you also need people to want to put in the effort to buy or install it.
- maverick_iceman 10y ago
  >It has happened that economic growth has untethered itself from fossil fuel growth almost everywhere in the Western world. Hmm, then why is 67% of US electricity production is from fossil fuels?[1] [1] https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=427&t=3 https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=427&t=3
  - Brakenshire 10y ago
    Yes, that is saying a different thing. It has been that use of fossil fuels has been correlated to economic growth for 150 years. This is the first period in history when the Western countries have grown their economies while reducing their use of fossil fuels.

by sambe 10y ago

Brakenshire 10y ago

> It's never happened before and it won't happen for this It has happened that economic growth has untethered itself from fossil fuel growth almost everywhere in the Western world. I think consumer pressure can do something, apart from anything people just using it as an excuse to save money will do something. I agree that most of it has to be systemic, but there's a combination there. You need for instance cheaper storage and solar, more efficient a.c., better insulation, and so on, but you also need people to want to put in the effort to buy or install it.

maverick_iceman 10y ago
>It has happened that economic growth has untethered itself from fossil fuel growth almost everywhere in the Western world. Hmm, then why is 67% of US electricity production is from fossil fuels?[1] [1] https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=427&t=3 https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=427&t=3
- Brakenshire 10y ago
  Yes, that is saying a different thing. It has been that use of fossil fuels has been correlated to economic growth for 150 years. This is the first period in history when the Western countries have grown their economies while reducing their use of fossil fuels.