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Why was it a piece of cake to regulate CFC:s but no one has the vision to strive to control CO2 and methane. I'm 37 years old. I've been scared of CO2 accumuala

• salesguy222 10y ago
  Well, when nuclear power fails, it tends to fail catastrophically. That leads to more public pressure. Also, theres no clear reason why humans should be consuming so much electricity and energy, which is a particular wing of the green party ideology i would say that most likely, rich people's businesses produce a ton of CO2 as waste, but they don't consider it "waste". so they buy politicians with campaign funding and etc, who, upon grabbing power, block any attempts to (((regulate))) carbon waste
  • lightlyused 10y ago
    Not really on your first point. A lot of the failures are not in the dangerous radiation parts of the nuclear plant, but in the cooling and power generation aspects. I've worked on planning software for a plant and have seen the incredible detail that goes into plant maintenance. Done right, nuclear power is safe. Don't go thinking that I'm a conservative, very liberal and environmentally friendly here. I completely agree on your second point. It is all about profit.
    • salesguy222 10y ago
      Thank you! i am pro nuclear too. i was narrating why other people are anti-nuclear. couldn't agree with you more it is all about the profit for them. genuinely scared of how powerful they are
  • gus_massa 10y ago
    Dams failure can be even more catastrophic, but people is not worried about it. For example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam > Its failure in 1975 caused more casualties than any other dam failure in history at an estimated 171,000 deaths and 11 million displaced.[1] The dam was subsequently rebuilt.
    • literallycancer 10y ago
      Case in point, the Mosul Dam is predicted to fail soon, but the local government doesn't really care.[1] By the time the flood wave rolled past Baghdad and exhausted itself, as many as one and a half million people could be dead. 1 - http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/02/a-bigger-problem-than-isis http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/02/a-bigger-proble...
    • fossuser 10y ago
      I think that's a disingenuous comparison. While a dam failure may kill more people, a nuclear disaster can leave a place uninhabitable for a thousand years. Radiation sickness and damage is also arguably scarier to the public than risk of physical harm from a dam failure. A lot of people have some religious argument against Nuclear power - I'm not one of them, but a lot of other people seem to downplay the real risks.
      • anigbrowl 10y ago
        We've had a bunch of failures, and they've been bad, but the number of casualties has been low and the damage largely local. 3 mile island, Chernobyl, Fukushima are all obvious examples. I'm not downplaying the risk here but she shouldn't exaggerate it either. I agree about the religious argument but istm that getting past that requires looking at the actual proportions of economic harm involved.
      • salesguy222 10y ago
        Thank you for writing this. I was merely describing why some people have problems with nuclear (which do exist), and why they are so public and controversial Now im being downvoted because dams kill more people when they fail. I'm sure they do! But that doesn't change the fact that [people other than myself] will continue to oppose nuclear because of its negative PR
  • ianai 10y ago
    I think you're probably basing your statement on failures on what's reported in mass media. Mass media definitely pick up the biggest stories. You can't use that as a sample space. Secondly, many people have become rich due to oil. Those same companies and tycoons pay off politicians hugely.
  • na85 10y ago
    How am I supposed to interpret the parentheses around the word regulate in your comment?
    • CharlesW 10y ago
      It's shocking to see this being normalized on HN. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triple_parentheses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triple_parentheses
      • refurb 10y ago
        I don't think "regulate" is a Jewish name.
        • mikeyouse 10y ago
          The type of person that uses those parantheses usually thinks that there is a global cabal of Jews running the world, so when he says (((regulate))) he's insinuating some plot by the 'globalists' to further their own aims.
          • salesguy222 10y ago
            I am insinuating that some of the largest producers of carbon waste feel that there is a Jewish Globalist conspiracy to affect their profit margins. To confirm this, you could just look at the politicians they fund. Hint, they aren't pro-Globalism. So I don't appreciate that people are downvoting me for using ((())) when I was using it to describe someone's views, not my own
      • aswanson 10y ago
        I'm hoping the ggp did not intend for it to mean that, in good faith. It's probably a mistaken interpretation.
        • salesguy222 10y ago
          Thanks for writing this, I didn't. I knew ((())) had right wing origins, but I didn't know the history of it regarding Jewish names. In my comment, I described that some business owners who fund right wing politicians feel that there is a globalist conspiracy to cut into their biz profit margins, by penalizing carbon waste. Hence, they feel (((regulation))) is a conspiracy against their personal business empires. This is all my analysis. It is not to say that I believe people who believe in regulations are Jewish, and that they should be penalized for this. So I am upset that people downvoted me, if they thought I am an anti-semite
  • saxonklaxon 10y ago
    >when nuclear power fails, it tends to fail catastrophically. Nuclear fission, right? And let's not forget that coal mining accidents are equally catastrophic for the families of the victims. >theres no clear reason why humans should be consuming so much electricity and energy On the contrary, we have no choice but to consume more power. This isn't just a matter of wanting more things: it's about survival. The talk is about climate change and animal extinctions right now but there's an unlimited number of additional environmental problems to solve if we and our fellow organisms are to survive. Warming, meteor strikes, supervolcanoes, the next ice age -- these are are just four of the known problems. So we have no choice but to continue to increase our scientific knowledge, technology and wealth. This entails the efficient and safe wielding of greater and greater quantities of energy.
    • lutorm 10y ago
      efficient is the key. It's about outcomes. There's nothing saying we need greater quantities of energy, because very little of the things we as a civilization do are fundamentally energy-limited. Over the long term, there is no shortage of energy. Unless you're going to argue about Dyson-sphere limits, the Sun provides an amount of energy far in excess of what we'd need. On that scale, the total energy available through fossil fuels and nuclear fission is a drop in the proverbial ocean.
  • biofox 10y ago
    It has nothing to do with nuclear power failing catastrophically. As another commenter points out, the failure of damns can be even more destructive. I think the issue is that nuclear power is intimately linked to nuclear weapons. As a result, you end up with images like these in the public imagination (Simpsons clips), which have no foundation in reality: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-p7Rs_6l5g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-p7Rs_6l5g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRLf8k-2bY4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRLf8k-2bY4
• avar 10y ago
  This article from 1990 in the NYT tries to account for the cost of banning CFC's[1]. At worst it's a few hundred billion USD. We've spent way more than that on CO^2 via the Kyoto accords etc. Of course the problem isn't solved, but that's because it's a way bigger problem. We've acted even more on CO^2 than CFC's, but the problem of CFC's was much smaller and easier to solve. 1. http://www.nytimes.com/1990/07/17/science/grappling-with-the-cost-of-saving-earth-s-ozone.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/1990/07/17/science/grappling-with-the...
• throwaway5752 10y ago
  It wasn't a piece of cake at all, and tons of people still complain about not being able to get Freon (or get it illegally)
  • robk 10y ago
    Does anyone else automatically down vote any account with throwaway in the name?
    • throwaway5752 10y ago
      I don't know if you're saying that you do or not, but as far as anecdote goes: yes, lots of people do. I don't really care, and my points get to stand on their own merit.
    • fredsted 10y ago
      Why would anyone do that?
      • anigbrowl 10y ago
        I don't, but the primary reasons to use a throwaway account are if you want to discuss something deeply personal without giving yourself away, or hide your identity so you can BS or insult people. It's easy enough to be anonymous on HN and still have a persistent identity; if someone resorts to burner accounts others are going to assume it's for trolling.
        • throwaway5752 10y ago
          I've had this account for more than 3 years as you can see. I can't help if people incorrectly assume it's a burner because of the name. I considered it throwaway at first, but I don't care to bother to change it at this point. And like I said, it lets my points stand on their own merit, which I consider a positive.
          • anigbrowl 10y ago
• api 10y ago
  There is far more money involved, and unlike CFCs there are no easy plug and play substitutes. Nuclear power is not a panacea. It looks good on paper but in practice there are tons of hidden costs and failures can be catastrophic. It also pretty much demands hefty regulation, which further adds to the cost in both monetary and social ways. Finally there is a whole geopolitical order built around fossil fuels. Changing our energy system would fundamentally alter the power balance of the world.
  • throwaway5752 10y ago
    Solar, wind, hydro, geothermal, and nuclear add up to well more than current usage. Nuclear could be phased out as storage or distributed grid matured. With modifications to standards of living expectations we could live renewably as a species and save oil and gas for plastics and other materials that require hydrocarbon feedstock. The trouble is that this would result in a much lower consumption world. And lots of people in the are rich as a result unneccessary consumption.
    • nitrogen 10y ago
      "modifications to standard of living expectations" are purely untenable and ultimately destructive to everything that defines human society. If you really want to get people to oppose you, try to guilt trip them, tell them they have to be too cold all winter and too hot all summer, tell them they can never travel again, cram them into tiny apartments where they can hear every bodily function their neighbor performs. The solution to resource depletion and pollution is to give people what they want in a way that's actually sustainable. Build thicker walls and floors to block sound and conserve energy. Design more efficient lighting and appliances. Develop renewable energy. Etc. Everything non-essential to human survival is everything that makes us human.
      • throwaway5752 10y ago
        I would make one quibble. The hard constraint is the sustainable part, the planet doesn't care about our intangible needs. I'm not saying that everyone should live in massive planned urban districts, but on average we have to use less than X energy across Y people, and we are very far away from averaging X/Y per capita.
• bobbington 10y ago
  CO2 is a natural element that is everywhere. To stop producing it requires never driving anything but an electric car, never flying a plane, and using energy from only "green" sources. That is just not a transition the world can make over night. Doing so would decimate economies, and people would probably end up starving. Currently gasoline is by far the most efficient way to store energy on a small scale. but if people couldn't drive tractors where would the food come from? If people couldn't drive trucks how would food be transported? I'm time people will solve these problems. However it's best not to worry because co2 is a natural element that the environment naturally soaks up. I don't think CFCs are naturally absorbed either
  • botexpert 10y ago
    True, what you can do is plant trees and stop cutting trees. Plant trees that suck more CO2. Amazon rainforest is being cut enormously. About 90% of cut Amazon is solely for beef production and soy exports for USA beef production. Of course, the enormous convenient life of average USA citizen might need more government control (24/7 AC, cars everywhere, heavy reliance on animal agriculture etc.) and that stuff costs but it is long-term investment. Of course, no one sees 100 years as long-term, 100 years is invisible. Huge amount of forest also cut for palm oil. The new plant oil that ends up everywhere (sunflower oil turned out more expensive in this millenia). I've heard from many parents that they don't care if their lifestyle habits promote the business-as-usual culture.
    • dozzie 10y ago
      Wasn't Amazon forest deemed net producer of CO2 some time ago? If we get a direction of such a large processes wrong, how the hell are we so sure that CO2 level is even a source of problem instead of being a result?
      • botexpert 10y ago
        It still produces less CO2. This will of course not be a fact if fire rate increases. It's a feedback loop. The warmer it gets more CO2 gets produced, not just by humans but by nature. The melting of ice caps will produce about 100 years of human CO2 equivalent methane (CO2 yearly production of 2016, I believe). Humans are the source of the problem. They can remove themselves from the equation but it requires a less convenient life for most.
• bobbington 10y ago
  CO2 is a natural element that is everywhere. To stop producing it requires never driving anything but an electric car and using energy from only "green" sources. That is just not a transition the world can make over night. Doing so would decimate economies, and people would probably end up starving. Currently gasoline is by far the most efficient way to store energy on a small scale. but if people couldn't drive tractors where would the food come from? If people couldn't drive trucks how would food be transported? I'm time people will solve these problems. However it's best not to worry because co2 is a natural element that the environment naturally soaks up. I don't think CFCs are naturally absorbed either
• gus_massa 10y ago
  It's possible to replace CFC with other gases. Just replace some of the F with Cl or something. It's not easy because CFC are incredible good at not reacting with anything. They are so good that they can survive all the way up to the upper atmosphere to cause havoc. If you replace the F by Cl or something you must do a lot of research to ensure the good properties in the new molecule version. So it's a problem that can be solved with research, time and money. The problem with CO2 is that a lot of the energy requirements are solved by the equations: coal/petrol/gas + O2 --> CO2 + H2O + energy energy --> money Or to simplify it whatever --> CO2 + money And it's not possible to replace the CO2 in that equation. No amount of money, time , research can fix this. You only try to use a completely different method to produce energy. But most of the alternative methods are more expensive than a good old coal plant (if you ignore the social cost of pollution and the dangers of coal extraction). I think that nuclear and hydroelectric are cheaper, but they also have some hidden cost.
  • known 10y ago
    Trees?
    • Redoubts 10y ago
      We'd need a lot of trees In 2000, the IPCC gathered the available evidence for a special report which concluded that tree-planting could sequester (remove from the atmosphere) around 1.1–1.6 GT of CO2 per year. That compares to total global greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to 50 GT of CO2 in 2004. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/nov/29/planting-trees-climate-change https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/nov/29/planting...
      • pas 10y ago
        Just to avoid confusion, that's 50GT due to human activities. http://climatica.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/IPCC_WG3_SPM_Figure_1.png http://climatica.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/IPCC_WG3_... (FOLU is forestry and other land use)
    • r00fus 10y ago
• tech5000 10y ago
  CFCs were a smaller problem, with cost effective alternatives available. So its more feasible to avoid The tragedy of the commons. In the case of CO2 and methane, its harder to move to more costly approaches given that you know that your competitor is not doing so (and possibly does not feel they can do so) and so would have a cost advantage over you, possibly putting at risk your actual economic viability. There is often a reluctance to support more costly non-CO2 producing approaches to energy production given that those approaches have been around longest and are often cheapest. Some renewable energy technologies are gaining market acceptance and are cost-competitive with hydrocarbons, but unless Tesla and its peers take off in a big way, hydrocarbons unfortunately aren't going away.
• mirimir 10y ago
  In fighting to ban CFCs, advocates could point to immediate impacts. Solar UV intensity in southern South America was occasionally hitting hazardous levels. And who wants skin cancer? With CO2 emissions, serious impacts are all long-term, across multiple generations. On short time scales, it's nontrivial to detect effects, and methodology and measurements are readily disputed. The truly insidious aspect, though, is how thoroughly committed to massive and persistent change the climate system becomes, before any serious impacts are apparent.
• taymba 10y ago
  Because it's harder to feel urgency when the heat is slooowly turned up on you? Until it's too late.
• deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
• rodgerd 10y ago
  > Why was it a piece of cake to regulate CFC:s but no one has the vision to strive to control CO2 and methane. Because for ordinary people, the CFC story is a wonderful one. Multi-national co-operation has halted and begun to roll back a serious environmental degredation. For a small number of people who are slightly less rich thatn they might otherwise have been, though, it was a catastrophe, something that must never be allowed to happen again; much like the public health victories areound tobacco and lead, it energised a small slice of the world to make sure that future efforts (in the current case, the damagfe of greenhouse gases) are never again repeated. No matter what the cost.
  • strken 10y ago
    I'm not sure that this is the whole story - rather, the risk of CFCs was so obvious that nobody could convincingly argue against it. To this day, going outside in Tasmania burns you noticeably faster than anywhere else in the world. Global warming, on the other hand, is a slow death by a thousand cuts. Extreme weather events grow more frequent, fishing becomes less productive, desertification takes more land, the sea rises a little higher, and so on - and the endgame is more complicated and less understandable, too. It's easier to ignore.
• sfifs 10y ago
  Primarily due lack of a sufficiently cheap and convenient high energy density storage... though we are getting closer now with all the modern research on batteries thanks to the economic incentive to power ever thinner and power hungry smartphones. On the energy generation side, it's taken pretty advanced tech to get efficiencies upto acceptable levels in Solar and Wind. Nuclear unfortunately has proven to have drastic fast acting negative externalities on failure (mass evacuation, increase in cancer rates) and tbe Industry has consistently shown lack of competence in preventing failure. So it's no surprise people have soured on it. Given the trajectory of tech development, I'm fairly confident we'll get there - hopefully before we screw up our climate too much.
• anigbrowl 10y ago
  A combination of selfishness and outright bullshit. Have you ever noticed that the people who pour scorn on climate prediction and say it's all just playing with models and overactive imagination on the part of scientists are perfectly comfortable making dire economic predictions about the costs of mitigating climate change, despite economics' relative crudity? Have you ever seen an economic model that even aspires to the sophistication of climate models? Or economic metrics that were broken out to measure unemployment trends and glows of goods, labor and capital? such data exist but they're rarely more fine-grained than the state level and they're horribly crude because people feel an economic incentive to hoard that data for profit. <ost of the so-called skeptics don't know any economics beyond basic things like how to find equilibrium pricing between supply and demand curves and some outdated macroeconomic myths, but they know that the majority of people don't get economics and can be easily scared with threats of recession. That's how we wound up with a President that claims climate change is a myth created by the Chinese to steal their jobs and a dominant party that's champing at the bit to sweep away any and all environmental regulation so they can make a quick buck.
  • andromeduck 10y ago
    Yep, also noticed most of the people screaming about those people are also adamantly against the one proven technology ready to tackle this problem. They'd rather watch our planet die.
    • lutorm 10y ago
      I assume you're referring to nuclear power, which a) has its own environmental problems and b) is really expensive, to the point of not being cost-competitive. In general, it seems the people who are complaining about government subsidies for renewable energy development have no problems with massive government subsidies to the nuclear power industry. I'm not anti-nuclear, per se, but given the huge potential downsides and massive lead times of current nuclear projects I don't think it's at all "ready to tackle this problem". But we should absolutely fund research into technologies like MSR, thorium, etc. We do need something to replace base loads, and I don't think biomass is going to cut it.
• leppr 10y ago
  Don't underestimate how hard it is to fight against an adversary with money. "Green" parties and organizations are infiltrated by double-game lobbyists and influencers from all fronts trying to save their own industry's interests. What's the easiest way to defeat an adversary? Play it against itself. The same way governments will want to make rebellious opposition groups into violent terrorists, it makes all the sense in the world to make ecologists into irrational, counter-productive idealists. What kind of powerful (=wealthy) organization benefits short to mid-term from reducing pollution? I fail to see any. The issue of ecology is IMO the hardest fight humanity has had to fight.
• caseymarquis 10y ago
  Nuclear waste is something which needs to be dealt with over the course of multiple human lifetimes. I don't think creating something like that is responsible.
  • sliken 10y ago
    And the radioactivity of mining coal (coal mines produce more than nuclear plants), ruined water, and ruined air are somehow better? Not like the CO2 magically decays or something. Future generations will have to deal with less clean air, less clean water, more CO2, higher ocean levels, etc. From my reading of it, nuclear waste is a thorny political issue, not a technical issue. There's pleny of reasonable solution. One of my favorites was mixing it into molten glass, pouring that into a steel torpedo shaped tube, and dropping them in the ocean near a subduction zone where there's a few inches of silt per year. By the time they hit they have enough speed to sink in 10s of eet, won't rupture any time soon, but when they do they will be buried even deeper by silt. Of course eventually they will enter the subduction zone.