3 ms·

Yeah it's a tricky thing to write about concisely. On the one hand I wanted to add nuance to the alarmist headline, on the other (of course) I 100% agree with "

by Aachen 6y ago

Yeah it's a tricky thing to write about concisely. On the one hand I wanted to add nuance to the alarmist headline, on the other (of course) I 100% agree with "let's not fuck around with the entire planet with tricky to predict effects like gulf stream etc." I'm the kind of person that annoys all the Germans by driving 95km/h on highways because it cuts fuel emissions nearly in half compared to the recommended speed of 130km/h. We don't even pay for fuel, that's paid by my SO's employer, it's purely because it adds like 10% of time on most trips (those 2-3 minutes are negligible) and allows me to visit family without feeling as bad about individual transport (public transport isn't really an option here for trips further than the next city over, extremely poor connections even by German standards). Or wear extra clothing and put a blanket over my legs while working and see how low we can put the heater. Or not heat the bedroom at all during fall/spring and take a hot water bottle up to get warm under the blanket (must be way more efficient than heating the whole room up). In short, yep I'm with you on not gambling on these estimates. But I'm also for nuance and being realistic lest someone claims that "ökos" / climate weirdos hugely exaggerated again and it's all not so bad. I find it tricky.

pas 6y ago
Or go faster and plant trees. If you pay for it that helps tree planting economies of scale. (Reforestation, not just monoculture.) I tried to do the same thing. Yes, individual actions have CO2e costs. It's not you, nor me, nor all of HN together that even can do anything impactful. Setting an example at best. (But then simply presenting a united coherent "yes carbon tax, yes ASAP, yes 125 USD/t" to everybody we discuss this with would probably help more.) That said, irrational alarmism is its own kind of hell.
- Aachen 6y ago
  Planting trees, carbon capture, etc. is NOT "going faster". It's definitely good if you can do it supplementary, if you have money to burn after funding things that will help reduce emissions (roof insulation, double windows, replace car with electric car, add rooftop solar, fund a solar park or wind turbine nearby, etc.), but in virtually all cases it's much more expensive than reducing emissions and helping others do the same. We need to explore how to live sustainably rather than hope everyone will pay for their share of carbon capture (in the form of trees or whatever) while "the others" fix the underlying problem. We'd need an absolutely humongous number of trees or capture plants to retrieve today's emissions. That said, I was actually just writing about the topic of planting trees :) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25680156 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25680156 > For what it's worth, if you have unavoidable emissions today that you want to compensate, and want to also fund the people working on CO2 capturing technology, see https://climeworks.shop https://climeworks.shop for a pay-what-you-want option. I don't really believe in planting trees (which is way cheaper per ton of CO2 it claims to absolve you of), and these machines apparently emit "only" 10kg for every 100kg of CO2 captured (90% effective sounds reasonable), and it's accounted for who claimed which share of the machine's captured volume so it sounds directly effective to me. It's just that the scale is peanuts and will remain so until public bodies and companies start to run out of emission reduction options and decide to use it - but at that point we better have this tech geared up. I do need to sleep still tonight (0230 here) so I won't now type out (on mobile) the reasons I don't think trees are a reliable option. And by tomorrow it won't matter anymore, nobody will read it (I don't like the ephemerality of HN/reddit threads.) So these are my 2ct, hope I could clarify my reasoning as I will go sleep now.
  - pas 6y ago
    Oh, thanks! Quite a nice setup partnering with a geothermic power plant! Currently I prefer reforestation (or even better yet restoration of swamplands), because it's partly EU funded, so there's a small multiplier effect, and there's still a lot of land for "low hanging" forests, which help with local climate patterns a bit. I'm aware of what >>we<< need to do, and I'm already working on the better heating/insulation part. But individual action is nothing compared to advocacy in terms of impact.
    - Aachen 6y ago
      That multiplier effect sounds cool, could you link more info that I can check out tomorrow? Thanks!
      - pas 6y ago
        I know about it because I've a friend who basically bought a big plot of land and requested funds to plant trees. EU reforestation, google autocompleted it halfway to eu funding for reforestation :o "During the current 2014-2020 funding period the programme will contribute approximately €3.4 billion more. The LIFE programme is divided into two sub-programmes, one for environment (representing 75% of the overall financial envelope) and one for climate action (representing 25% of the envelope)." https://lifereforest.com/life-programme/ https://lifereforest.com/life-programme/ "Some EUR 8.2 billion has been earmarked for the 2015-2020 period (27% for reforestation, 18% to make forests more resilient and 18% for damage prevention)." https://www.europarl.europa.eu/factsheets/en/sheet/105/the-european-union-and-forests https://www.europarl.europa.eu/factsheets/en/sheet/105/the-e...
  - samatman 6y ago
    I don't see the actual difference between an individual choosing to drive slowly, eat vegan, and be cold at home, and that same individual choosing to spend extra for sequestration. Assuming that the offsets are honest, admittedly a big if. One is painful in the lifestyle, one in the wallet, and both are drops in the bucket compared to changes on a civilizational level. Which isn't to say you or anyone shouldn't pursue your own sense of moral behavior, quite the opposite in fact. I would even say that using a normal amount of, say, electricity, but offsetting it with carbon capture, has one advantage: using a subnormal amount makes power fractionally cheaper for others. But by how much? Well... by about the amount of difference any one set of human actions makes.
- samaxe 6y ago
  The ocean has far more effect on co2 than trees. The lush rain forests in South America are C02 neutral, because there is so much life in the rain forest it uses up all the oxygen it produces. The idea that the rain forest are the “lungs” of the earth is just a myth, the oceans are.
  - pas 6y ago
    Yes, but trees are good at short term carbon capture. And getting back more productive space for our ecosystems is also an important goal. Sure, it's nothing of what we'll have to sequester, but - as I already mentioned - currently it's quite a low hanging fruit.
andi999 6y ago
Did you measure fuel consumption per km? Difference of gas usage by going 130 or 95 sounds way to high for me.
- saalweachter 6y ago
  Wind resistance is proportional to the square of speed -- you experience 90% more going 130 vs 95.
  - andi999 6y ago
    True, but I do not think wind resistance is 100% or your full consumption. But even if it were, then you would you 90% more fuel per hour. But in on case travel more than 30% further. But if I were to guess (at least from my car, but I will check it in the future) it is more like 6,2l/100km at 100km/h and 7l/100km at 130km/h.
- Aachen 6y ago
  > Did you measure fuel consumption per km? I have a configurable display that shows average fuel consumption per 100km, momentary fuel consumption per 100km, kilometers remaining with available fuel, or some other value that I forgot about. It's always set to the momentary fuel consumption and I have a good idea about how much things like grades (in/declines), wind, acceleration, etc. impact the consumption. The consumption per 100km is not the best measure for acceleration or idling (more useful would be something like "ml used in last 10 seconds"), but it give me some indication. Using the cruise control to accelerate (when safe; e.g. on steep uphill highway on-ramps you need to shift down and put that pedal down to get to a more safe merging speed) it's limited to about 8-9l/100km which is pretty good (many Germans consider such amounts normal for their cruising speed, let alone accelerating).

by Aachen 6y ago

pas 6y ago

Or go faster and plant trees. If you pay for it that helps tree planting economies of scale. (Reforestation, not just monoculture.) I tried to do the same thing. Yes, individual actions have CO2e costs. It's not you, nor me, nor all of HN together that even can do anything impactful. Setting an example at best. (But then simply presenting a united coherent "yes carbon tax, yes ASAP, yes 125 USD/t" to everybody we discuss this with would probably help more.) That said, irrational alarmism is its own kind of hell.

Aachen 6y ago
Planting trees, carbon capture, etc. is NOT "going faster". It's definitely good if you can do it supplementary, if you have money to burn after funding things that will help reduce emissions (roof insulation, double windows, replace car with electric car, add rooftop solar, fund a solar park or wind turbine nearby, etc.), but in virtually all cases it's much more expensive than reducing emissions and helping others do the same. We need to explore how to live sustainably rather than hope everyone will pay for their share of carbon capture (in the form of trees or whatever) while "the others" fix the underlying problem. We'd need an absolutely humongous number of trees or capture plants to retrieve today's emissions. That said, I was actually just writing about the topic of planting trees :) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25680156 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25680156 > For what it's worth, if you have unavoidable emissions today that you want to compensate, and want to also fund the people working on CO2 capturing technology, see https://climeworks.shop https://climeworks.shop for a pay-what-you-want option. I don't really believe in planting trees (which is way cheaper per ton of CO2 it claims to absolve you of), and these machines apparently emit "only" 10kg for every 100kg of CO2 captured (90% effective sounds reasonable), and it's accounted for who claimed which share of the machine's captured volume so it sounds directly effective to me. It's just that the scale is peanuts and will remain so until public bodies and companies start to run out of emission reduction options and decide to use it - but at that point we better have this tech geared up. I do need to sleep still tonight (0230 here) so I won't now type out (on mobile) the reasons I don't think trees are a reliable option. And by tomorrow it won't matter anymore, nobody will read it (I don't like the ephemerality of HN/reddit threads.) So these are my 2ct, hope I could clarify my reasoning as I will go sleep now.
- pas 6y ago
  Oh, thanks! Quite a nice setup partnering with a geothermic power plant! Currently I prefer reforestation (or even better yet restoration of swamplands), because it's partly EU funded, so there's a small multiplier effect, and there's still a lot of land for "low hanging" forests, which help with local climate patterns a bit. I'm aware of what >>we<< need to do, and I'm already working on the better heating/insulation part. But individual action is nothing compared to advocacy in terms of impact.
  - Aachen 6y ago
    That multiplier effect sounds cool, could you link more info that I can check out tomorrow? Thanks!
    - pas 6y ago
      I know about it because I've a friend who basically bought a big plot of land and requested funds to plant trees. EU reforestation, google autocompleted it halfway to eu funding for reforestation :o "During the current 2014-2020 funding period the programme will contribute approximately €3.4 billion more. The LIFE programme is divided into two sub-programmes, one for environment (representing 75% of the overall financial envelope) and one for climate action (representing 25% of the envelope)." https://lifereforest.com/life-programme/ https://lifereforest.com/life-programme/ "Some EUR 8.2 billion has been earmarked for the 2015-2020 period (27% for reforestation, 18% to make forests more resilient and 18% for damage prevention)." https://www.europarl.europa.eu/factsheets/en/sheet/105/the-european-union-and-forests https://www.europarl.europa.eu/factsheets/en/sheet/105/the-e...
- samatman 6y ago
  I don't see the actual difference between an individual choosing to drive slowly, eat vegan, and be cold at home, and that same individual choosing to spend extra for sequestration. Assuming that the offsets are honest, admittedly a big if. One is painful in the lifestyle, one in the wallet, and both are drops in the bucket compared to changes on a civilizational level. Which isn't to say you or anyone shouldn't pursue your own sense of moral behavior, quite the opposite in fact. I would even say that using a normal amount of, say, electricity, but offsetting it with carbon capture, has one advantage: using a subnormal amount makes power fractionally cheaper for others. But by how much? Well... by about the amount of difference any one set of human actions makes.
samaxe 6y ago
The ocean has far more effect on co2 than trees. The lush rain forests in South America are C02 neutral, because there is so much life in the rain forest it uses up all the oxygen it produces. The idea that the rain forest are the “lungs” of the earth is just a myth, the oceans are.
- pas 6y ago
  Yes, but trees are good at short term carbon capture. And getting back more productive space for our ecosystems is also an important goal. Sure, it's nothing of what we'll have to sequester, but - as I already mentioned - currently it's quite a low hanging fruit.

andi999 6y ago

Did you measure fuel consumption per km? Difference of gas usage by going 130 or 95 sounds way to high for me.

saalweachter 6y ago
Wind resistance is proportional to the square of speed -- you experience 90% more going 130 vs 95.
- andi999 6y ago
  True, but I do not think wind resistance is 100% or your full consumption. But even if it were, then you would you 90% more fuel per hour. But in on case travel more than 30% further. But if I were to guess (at least from my car, but I will check it in the future) it is more like 6,2l/100km at 100km/h and 7l/100km at 130km/h.
Aachen 6y ago
> Did you measure fuel consumption per km? I have a configurable display that shows average fuel consumption per 100km, momentary fuel consumption per 100km, kilometers remaining with available fuel, or some other value that I forgot about. It's always set to the momentary fuel consumption and I have a good idea about how much things like grades (in/declines), wind, acceleration, etc. impact the consumption. The consumption per 100km is not the best measure for acceleration or idling (more useful would be something like "ml used in last 10 seconds"), but it give me some indication. Using the cruise control to accelerate (when safe; e.g. on steep uphill highway on-ramps you need to shift down and put that pedal down to get to a more safe merging speed) it's limited to about 8-9l/100km which is pretty good (many Germans consider such amounts normal for their cruising speed, let alone accelerating).