7 ms·

No country on Earth is taking the 2 degree climate target seriously

aurizon 6y ago
This confirms the widely held supposition that elected officials are, by and large, morons... At some point war will be declared on emission points. By that I mean fossil power plants will need to be destroyed by aggressive acts. If these acts are via domestic drone attacks by your own populace - so be it. It is possible that the situation will become dire, so countries will attack fossil fuel emitters in other countries as their own people start to starve by lack of crops. One hopes it will never come to that. There is, of course, the elephant in the room - stored methane clathrates (a complex of methane and water that forms under fairly low pressure-300 psi or so). They are mainly accumulated under permafrost areas, and as the earth warms and melts the permafrost, the clathrates decompose into methane and water.Large amounts are being exposed in the arctic, where they were formed under the ice caps over millions of years, and stayed metastable until lower pressure/warmer temps allowed them to decompose. Large areas in Northern Russia are now emitting methane from this. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methane_clathrate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methane_clathrate
- lotsofpulp 6y ago
  Half of American voters voted for someone that doesn’t even bother addressing climate change.
  - pmiller2 6y ago
    The sad irony here is that no matter which half you're talking about, this is probably going to play out as true in practice.
    - legolas2412 6y ago
      What? Biden addressed and plans to take action for climate change
      - pmiller2 6y ago
        And you believe everything a politician says? His "plans" are not worth the paper they're written on, as far as I"m concerned. I don't think Biden is going to do anything at all, when it comes down to it. He's too far up in the pockets of corporate interests that don't want him to.
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- selimthegrim 6y ago
  https://www.theweek.com/speedreads/946300/climate-scientists-throw-cold-water-arctic-methane-bomb-report https://www.theweek.com/speedreads/946300/climate-scientists...
  - aurizon 6y ago
    Plant matter rots and uses up al the O2, further rotting is anaerobic and emits methane. Water - methane form into 'cage complexes' AKA Clathrates. These are formed at various levels of underground pressure. This is all under the water table and with no O2 = lots of methane = lots of clathrates. Once formed the clathrates resemble ice and act like rock, they stay where they are. They can break down into methane and water if the temperature increases and also if the pressure drops. Drop them into water and they fizz like pop rocks. The problem is these clathrates accumulate with time. Plants rot, methane is formed and locked up in stable clathrates. Now we are releasing huge volumes of clathrates in all the melting permafrost zones. There are also ocean bottom clathrates - rotting sea weed/algae cold and under pressure. Since methane has 80 times the warming effect of CO2, it is going to become a huge problem over the next 200 years.
bzb6 6y ago
That’s because, quoting Sonny LoSpecchio, “nobody cares”.
PeterisP 6y ago
As the article says, taking the target seriously would mean drastic rapid changes to try and achieve it. Furthermore, it would require worldwide changes - unilaterally restricting yourself would give all the harm but none of the expected benefit. So every country on Earth has seriously decided that they are not willing to take on the cost of achieving that target; they haven't communicated it explicitly to their voters (because, let's be real, voters don't want to hear bad news), but IMHO that's a serious decision, and not an unilateral one but one that takes into account the will of the voters as well - I'm quite certain that if the necessary changes are actually undertaken anywhere, mandating major restrictions to lifestyles and economics, the mass of protesters will overwhelm the environmental activists and replace the government (with violence, if necessary) with someone else who'll "not take the 2 degree target seriously" and roll back the measures.
- nsoonhui 6y ago
  Wouldn't that defeat the purpose of Paris Record that they all signed?
hahaiscjaaka 6y ago
Note the article is from 2017. Since no major changes happened since then, the current scenario is much worse.
LatteLazy 6y ago
We've agreed as a species not to prevent global warming. The part I find confusing is that we all keep pretending otherwise. It's very confusing for me. Why do we do this?
- mac01021 6y ago
  What does "agreed as a species" mean? I was not consulted. Any time I talk about how society should act to stop anthropogenic climate change, I am not pretending to think the things I'm professing that I think.
  - austhrow743 6y ago
    Pretty strong consensus in any country with voting that climate change isn't a priority.
treeman79 6y ago
If all humans dropped dead tomorrow. What is the change? We’re still coming out of an ice age. So temperature is will go up. It’s just a matter of how much.
simonblack 6y ago
It may sound harsh, but that's a good thing for the planet. There are far too many humans in the world at present. The Earth needs to reduce that number to sustainable levels. By humans disregarding the problems of global warming, there will be global famines which will reduce human numbers markedly. Climate change is merely a symptom of TOO MANY HUMANS. It's pointless trying to reduce climate change without trying to reduce human numbers. We have a choice: reduce human numbers ourselves down to around 1-2 billion (possibly with a 'One child per woman' policy which would do the task without trauma) or have the number reduced forcibly (perhaps via the global famines or water-wars which will occur when climate change causes droughts and low water supplies). Being humans, we'll do nothing and be forced to undergo the trauma of having our numbers reduced forcibly.
- dnhz 6y ago
  Is there such thing as good/bad without consideration of the living beings on earth? It's life on the planet that matters, not the planet itself. "Good thing for the planet." How so? It seems unlikely to me that the results of climate change will be so dramatic as to kill 80% of all humans, unless climate change sparks some sort of global war involving nuclear weapons. That doesn't sound very good for the planet.
  - e9 6y ago
    It's not out of the realm of possibilities. Imagine some country being constantly bombarded by earthquakes, tsunamis and other destructive environmental changes to the point where people can't live normally. They will definitely rebel and try to take over land that doesn't have these issues. Much like what happened in ancient times, climate changes led to inhabitable areas and provoked wars between civilizations for land. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/climate-wars-conflicts-collapses-spurred-climate-change-180952862/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/climate-wars-conflict...
  - simonblack 6y ago
    Humans on Earth are analogous to bacteria in a petri dish, subject to the same limits on resources and unlimited growth. https://www.thoughtco.com/bacterial-growth-curve-phases-4172692 https://www.thoughtco.com/bacterial-growth-curve-phases-4172... Yes we can go ahead blindly, and destroy our living space and therefore our viable numbers. Or, we can control our growth, and bring it back to sustainable levels. If we destroy our environment (pollution, climate change, overfishing, etc), it will hold less people sustainably than if we don't destroy our environment and reduce our numbers voluntarily to those current sustainable levels. But, as I indicated above, humans are incapable of acting in their own best interests and it will happen forcibly by Nature and not to our liking.
eucryphia 6y ago
They take the prospect of international socialism a lot more seriously.
- anoncake 6y ago
  As a socialist, I have no idea what you are referring to.
exabrial 6y ago
Well that's because government are the wrong place to try and make change. A lot of failed policies have been put in place and we keep trying the same thing over and over again thinking we're smarter than the last people. Investment and innovation are where real and sustainable change happens.
- onecommentman 6y ago
  And we see that in renewable energy, where small, incremental improvements in technology over time and appropriate investment levels have led to increased adoption rates in practice. And no reason to think this increase in market share will ever shrink. Permanent lasting change. Great thing about tech advances...they never go backwards. They are there for the duration.
xiphias2 6y ago
What about Tuvalu? I think they care a lot. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/may/16/one-day-disappear-tuvalu-sinking-islands-rising-seas-climate-change https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/may/16/o...
- onecommentman 6y ago
  And what about Delhi and Beijing for air pollution, and coastal communities for overfishing, and Africa for desertification. Lot more children there. And high density urban areas stressing water and land resources...by definition more people impacted. One positive thing of the climate change discussion is as a gateway drug to awareness of these actual international development issues. Do wonder about Bangladesh and sea level rise...
sunstone 6y ago
Sure but with solar, wind and HVDC prices now below the cost of coal and continuing to drop, with transportation starting down the slippery cost slope of electrification, with China's mass build out with concrete and steel starting to wane in 2030 and beyond and finally with the world population bending the curve around 2050 there will be a dramatic lowering of new atmospheric carbon by 2050 and beyond. Will it be enough to keep sea levels from rising quickly? Fasten your seat belt and tighter your sphincter, by 2100 we'll know if we've won or lost. Personally I would like to see some temperature mitigation projects right now while we deal with the CO2 levels over the next 80 years.
- onecommentman 6y ago
  I’d personally prefer projects that provide direct and immediate(ish) benefits and whose benefits can be observed and measured near-term. Public health (including pollution), desertification, overfishing, ground water management, population growth and distribution... Then maybe give an extra nudge to those projects that are robustly expected to produce temperature mitigation effects based on 2020 climate models. And what are those interventions that are most robust to changes in the structural assumptions underlying those models? Maintain and grow current levels of environmental and earth science research as a matter of course. We live here. No need to hide behind the petticoats of climate change...

This confirms the widely held supposition that elected officials are, by and large, morons... At some point war will be declared on emission points. By that I mean fossil power plants will need to be destroyed by aggressive acts. If these acts are via domestic drone attacks by your own populace - so be it. It is possible that the situation will become dire, so countries will attack fossil fuel emitters in other countries as their own people start to starve by lack of crops. One hopes it will never come to that. There is, of course, the elephant in the room - stored methane clathrates (a complex of methane and water that forms under fairly low pressure-300 psi or so). They are mainly accumulated under permafrost areas, and as the earth warms and melts the permafrost, the clathrates decompose into methane and water.Large amounts are being exposed in the arctic, where they were formed under the ice caps over millions of years, and stayed metastable until lower pressure/warmer temps allowed them to decompose. Large areas in Northern Russia are now emitting methane from this. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methane_clathrate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methane_clathrate

lotsofpulp 6y ago
Half of American voters voted for someone that doesn’t even bother addressing climate change.
- pmiller2 6y ago
  The sad irony here is that no matter which half you're talking about, this is probably going to play out as true in practice.
  - legolas2412 6y ago
    What? Biden addressed and plans to take action for climate change
    - pmiller2 6y ago
      And you believe everything a politician says? His "plans" are not worth the paper they're written on, as far as I"m concerned. I don't think Biden is going to do anything at all, when it comes down to it. He's too far up in the pockets of corporate interests that don't want him to.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
selimthegrim 6y ago
https://www.theweek.com/speedreads/946300/climate-scientists-throw-cold-water-arctic-methane-bomb-report https://www.theweek.com/speedreads/946300/climate-scientists...
- aurizon 6y ago
  Plant matter rots and uses up al the O2, further rotting is anaerobic and emits methane. Water - methane form into 'cage complexes' AKA Clathrates. These are formed at various levels of underground pressure. This is all under the water table and with no O2 = lots of methane = lots of clathrates. Once formed the clathrates resemble ice and act like rock, they stay where they are. They can break down into methane and water if the temperature increases and also if the pressure drops. Drop them into water and they fizz like pop rocks. The problem is these clathrates accumulate with time. Plants rot, methane is formed and locked up in stable clathrates. Now we are releasing huge volumes of clathrates in all the melting permafrost zones. There are also ocean bottom clathrates - rotting sea weed/algae cold and under pressure. Since methane has 80 times the warming effect of CO2, it is going to become a huge problem over the next 200 years.

bzb6 6y ago

That’s because, quoting Sonny LoSpecchio, “nobody cares”.

PeterisP 6y ago

As the article says, taking the target seriously would mean drastic rapid changes to try and achieve it. Furthermore, it would require worldwide changes - unilaterally restricting yourself would give all the harm but none of the expected benefit. So every country on Earth has seriously decided that they are not willing to take on the cost of achieving that target; they haven't communicated it explicitly to their voters (because, let's be real, voters don't want to hear bad news), but IMHO that's a serious decision, and not an unilateral one but one that takes into account the will of the voters as well - I'm quite certain that if the necessary changes are actually undertaken anywhere, mandating major restrictions to lifestyles and economics, the mass of protesters will overwhelm the environmental activists and replace the government (with violence, if necessary) with someone else who'll "not take the 2 degree target seriously" and roll back the measures.

nsoonhui 6y ago
Wouldn't that defeat the purpose of Paris Record that they all signed?

hahaiscjaaka 6y ago

Note the article is from 2017. Since no major changes happened since then, the current scenario is much worse.

LatteLazy 6y ago

We've agreed as a species not to prevent global warming. The part I find confusing is that we all keep pretending otherwise. It's very confusing for me. Why do we do this?

mac01021 6y ago
What does "agreed as a species" mean? I was not consulted. Any time I talk about how society should act to stop anthropogenic climate change, I am not pretending to think the things I'm professing that I think.
- austhrow743 6y ago
  Pretty strong consensus in any country with voting that climate change isn't a priority.

treeman79 6y ago

If all humans dropped dead tomorrow. What is the change? We’re still coming out of an ice age. So temperature is will go up. It’s just a matter of how much.

simonblack 6y ago

It may sound harsh, but that's a good thing for the planet. There are far too many humans in the world at present. The Earth needs to reduce that number to sustainable levels. By humans disregarding the problems of global warming, there will be global famines which will reduce human numbers markedly. Climate change is merely a symptom of TOO MANY HUMANS. It's pointless trying to reduce climate change without trying to reduce human numbers. We have a choice: reduce human numbers ourselves down to around 1-2 billion (possibly with a 'One child per woman' policy which would do the task without trauma) or have the number reduced forcibly (perhaps via the global famines or water-wars which will occur when climate change causes droughts and low water supplies). Being humans, we'll do nothing and be forced to undergo the trauma of having our numbers reduced forcibly.

dnhz 6y ago
Is there such thing as good/bad without consideration of the living beings on earth? It's life on the planet that matters, not the planet itself. "Good thing for the planet." How so? It seems unlikely to me that the results of climate change will be so dramatic as to kill 80% of all humans, unless climate change sparks some sort of global war involving nuclear weapons. That doesn't sound very good for the planet.
- e9 6y ago
  It's not out of the realm of possibilities. Imagine some country being constantly bombarded by earthquakes, tsunamis and other destructive environmental changes to the point where people can't live normally. They will definitely rebel and try to take over land that doesn't have these issues. Much like what happened in ancient times, climate changes led to inhabitable areas and provoked wars between civilizations for land. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/climate-wars-conflicts-collapses-spurred-climate-change-180952862/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/climate-wars-conflict...
- simonblack 6y ago
  Humans on Earth are analogous to bacteria in a petri dish, subject to the same limits on resources and unlimited growth. https://www.thoughtco.com/bacterial-growth-curve-phases-4172692 https://www.thoughtco.com/bacterial-growth-curve-phases-4172... Yes we can go ahead blindly, and destroy our living space and therefore our viable numbers. Or, we can control our growth, and bring it back to sustainable levels. If we destroy our environment (pollution, climate change, overfishing, etc), it will hold less people sustainably than if we don't destroy our environment and reduce our numbers voluntarily to those current sustainable levels. But, as I indicated above, humans are incapable of acting in their own best interests and it will happen forcibly by Nature and not to our liking.

eucryphia 6y ago

They take the prospect of international socialism a lot more seriously.

anoncake 6y ago
As a socialist, I have no idea what you are referring to.

exabrial 6y ago

Well that's because government are the wrong place to try and make change. A lot of failed policies have been put in place and we keep trying the same thing over and over again thinking we're smarter than the last people. Investment and innovation are where real and sustainable change happens.

onecommentman 6y ago
And we see that in renewable energy, where small, incremental improvements in technology over time and appropriate investment levels have led to increased adoption rates in practice. And no reason to think this increase in market share will ever shrink. Permanent lasting change. Great thing about tech advances...they never go backwards. They are there for the duration.

xiphias2 6y ago

What about Tuvalu? I think they care a lot. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/may/16/one-day-disappear-tuvalu-sinking-islands-rising-seas-climate-change https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/may/16/o...

onecommentman 6y ago
And what about Delhi and Beijing for air pollution, and coastal communities for overfishing, and Africa for desertification. Lot more children there. And high density urban areas stressing water and land resources...by definition more people impacted. One positive thing of the climate change discussion is as a gateway drug to awareness of these actual international development issues. Do wonder about Bangladesh and sea level rise...

sunstone 6y ago

Sure but with solar, wind and HVDC prices now below the cost of coal and continuing to drop, with transportation starting down the slippery cost slope of electrification, with China's mass build out with concrete and steel starting to wane in 2030 and beyond and finally with the world population bending the curve around 2050 there will be a dramatic lowering of new atmospheric carbon by 2050 and beyond. Will it be enough to keep sea levels from rising quickly? Fasten your seat belt and tighter your sphincter, by 2100 we'll know if we've won or lost. Personally I would like to see some temperature mitigation projects right now while we deal with the CO2 levels over the next 80 years.

onecommentman 6y ago
I’d personally prefer projects that provide direct and immediate(ish) benefits and whose benefits can be observed and measured near-term. Public health (including pollution), desertification, overfishing, ground water management, population growth and distribution... Then maybe give an extra nudge to those projects that are robustly expected to produce temperature mitigation effects based on 2020 climate models. And what are those interventions that are most robust to changes in the structural assumptions underlying those models? Maintain and grow current levels of environmental and earth science research as a matter of course. We live here. No need to hide behind the petticoats of climate change...