3 ms·

> A key factor of for solving climate change will be actions like this Maybe, but seeing how Western nation's personal transport being way down due to COVID ha

by gedy 6y ago

> A key factor of for solving climate change will be actions like this Maybe, but seeing how Western nation's personal transport being way down due to COVID having little effect on CO2 leads me believe the real issue for the future is China's manufacturing sector, which will not go down.

iso1631 6y ago
Countries need to charge a carbon tax - including on imports. Massive boost to local, green, manufacturing and trade. The politcal view is "can't do that, price of cheap imported tat will increase and people would have to buy locally, which would be awful"
- gedy 6y ago
  > including on imports Yes this is key, as otherwise it's just outsourcing to others and hiding under carpet at the expense of local jobs.
  - iso1631 6y ago
    Worse than that, rather than using 100KWh of natural gas power to generate, you buy from abroad, from a less efficient producer who uses 150kWh of coal fired power, and then use another 100kWh of oil power to transport it. With gas being 1 "badness" per 100KWh, oil being 2 and coal being 3, this would mean avoiding 1 unit locally, but getting importing 5 units. The beauty of a carbon tax is that it satisfies those on both the environmental side ("the left") and the localism side ("the right"). The only ones not liking it are globalists that don't care about the environment.
- 0wis 6y ago
  May need more cultural changes before a law. Trials in France haven’t worked. Minimalism, KonMari methods and digital nomad trends (to name a few) are showing that you can live a very happy, fulfilled and wealthy life with a lot less material stuff. A solution could be to be mass communicate on this to help people become confident enough for a carbon tax.
randlet 6y ago
Isn't calling it "China's manufacturing sector" a bit disingenuous? For better or worse China's manufacturing sector is actually the western worlds manufacturing sector.
- cantankerous 6y ago
  China is where the west hides its dirty manufacturing.
- gedy 6y ago
  No, because a lot of "gotta do something" actions in the west don't practically matter in the short or long term (I'm discounting "raising awareness" type goals). Whether or not Chinese manufacturing is the west's fault is secondary to reducing China's growing output.
bilbo0s 6y ago
Off topic, but what's odd about COVID is that China's manufacturing sector is down as well. Even in absolute terms. It makes me realize there are things out there that I'm obviously not even aware of that cause us to pump all this CO2 into the air. Or maybe the transportation and power generation sectors pollute far more than what I read and believed? Or maybe clothing manufacture? Or food? Who knows? But it's made me really curious about what it is out there that hasn't gone down during COVID? (And not just because I want to make a fast buck. It's genuine curiosity.)
- randlet 6y ago
  > Who knows? The EPA knows! [0] Global greenhouse gas emissions can also be broken down by the economic activities that lead to their production.[1] 25% is from electricity and heat production; 14% from transport; 6% from residential and commercial buildings; 21% from industry; 24% from agriculture, forestry and other land use; 10% from other energy uses.Source: IPCC (2014); [0] https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/global-greenhouse-gas-emissions-data https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/global-greenhouse-gas-emiss...
  - treeman79 6y ago
    Weird overlap of people who love bitcoin and reducing power usage.
    - nytgop77 6y ago
      I name them hipsters.
  - bilbo0s 6y ago
    Ah. So it is power generation and farming. That makes sense. Thanks. So as a species, our big gains against global warming are going to be made by reducing CO2 output from the power generation and food production sectors.
- cagenut 6y ago
  I'm particularly fond of the "ourworldindata" website because they combine a very direct and focused outline of the facts with clear visual graphs and charts. IMHO its impossible to understand the scope and complexity of climate change and greenhouse gas emissions without picturing a lot of charts in your head. This pie chart in particular is a very good starting point: https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector#energy-electricity-heat-and-transport-73-2 https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector#energy-electr...

by gedy 6y ago

iso1631 6y ago

Countries need to charge a carbon tax - including on imports. Massive boost to local, green, manufacturing and trade. The politcal view is "can't do that, price of cheap imported tat will increase and people would have to buy locally, which would be awful"

gedy 6y ago
> including on imports Yes this is key, as otherwise it's just outsourcing to others and hiding under carpet at the expense of local jobs.
- iso1631 6y ago
  Worse than that, rather than using 100KWh of natural gas power to generate, you buy from abroad, from a less efficient producer who uses 150kWh of coal fired power, and then use another 100kWh of oil power to transport it. With gas being 1 "badness" per 100KWh, oil being 2 and coal being 3, this would mean avoiding 1 unit locally, but getting importing 5 units. The beauty of a carbon tax is that it satisfies those on both the environmental side ("the left") and the localism side ("the right"). The only ones not liking it are globalists that don't care about the environment.
0wis 6y ago
May need more cultural changes before a law. Trials in France haven’t worked. Minimalism, KonMari methods and digital nomad trends (to name a few) are showing that you can live a very happy, fulfilled and wealthy life with a lot less material stuff. A solution could be to be mass communicate on this to help people become confident enough for a carbon tax.

randlet 6y ago

Isn't calling it "China's manufacturing sector" a bit disingenuous? For better or worse China's manufacturing sector is actually the western worlds manufacturing sector.

cantankerous 6y ago
China is where the west hides its dirty manufacturing.
gedy 6y ago
No, because a lot of "gotta do something" actions in the west don't practically matter in the short or long term (I'm discounting "raising awareness" type goals). Whether or not Chinese manufacturing is the west's fault is secondary to reducing China's growing output.

bilbo0s 6y ago

Off topic, but what's odd about COVID is that China's manufacturing sector is down as well. Even in absolute terms. It makes me realize there are things out there that I'm obviously not even aware of that cause us to pump all this CO2 into the air. Or maybe the transportation and power generation sectors pollute far more than what I read and believed? Or maybe clothing manufacture? Or food? Who knows? But it's made me really curious about what it is out there that hasn't gone down during COVID? (And not just because I want to make a fast buck. It's genuine curiosity.)

randlet 6y ago
> Who knows? The EPA knows! [0] Global greenhouse gas emissions can also be broken down by the economic activities that lead to their production.[1] 25% is from electricity and heat production; 14% from transport; 6% from residential and commercial buildings; 21% from industry; 24% from agriculture, forestry and other land use; 10% from other energy uses.Source: IPCC (2014); [0] https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/global-greenhouse-gas-emissions-data https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/global-greenhouse-gas-emiss...
- treeman79 6y ago
  Weird overlap of people who love bitcoin and reducing power usage.
  - nytgop77 6y ago
    I name them hipsters.
- bilbo0s 6y ago
  Ah. So it is power generation and farming. That makes sense. Thanks. So as a species, our big gains against global warming are going to be made by reducing CO2 output from the power generation and food production sectors.
cagenut 6y ago
I'm particularly fond of the "ourworldindata" website because they combine a very direct and focused outline of the facts with clear visual graphs and charts. IMHO its impossible to understand the scope and complexity of climate change and greenhouse gas emissions without picturing a lot of charts in your head. This pie chart in particular is a very good starting point: https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector#energy-electricity-heat-and-transport-73-2 https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector#energy-electr...