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So we need to "limit population growth" among "some parts of the world" - is it fair to guess that you mean here subsaharan Africa and south Asia? - because the

So we need to "limit population growth" among "some parts of the world" - is it fair to guess that you mean here subsaharan Africa and south Asia? - because they don't consume much CO2 but will? No mention of the parts of the world that, uh, do consume much CO2, and will continue to do so?

culopatin 5y ago
Why don’t we just limit it all around? Why does someone need to have 4 kids which then, in rich countries, forces them to get a bigger car, use more energy, cool a bigger home, etc.
- julienb_sea 5y ago
  You don't need to limit it, as quality of life increases people have less children. Population growth rate is on a steady decline worldwide, and has or will plateau in developed countries in the near future.
- ArkanExplorer 5y ago
  Just implement carbon taxes based on the cost of removing CO2 from the atmosphere (probably $200-$500/tonne). This is going to mean about a 5-10% cost of living increase for the typical Westerner - affordable, and beneficial because it will also mean much less air pollution. It would also mean that the 2nd/3rd world would build up with renewable energy and electric transport from the ground up, instead of with fossil fuel infrastructure which will be difficult to replace.
  - twobitshifter 5y ago
    It’s a nice idea, but all consumption taxes are unpopular and federal tax revenues are just thrown into one big pile. Can we just spend a trillion a year to remove the CO2 instead?
    - ArkanExplorer 5y ago
      CO2 removal (and storage) at scale is impossible. We would basically have to recreate the Azolla event: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azolla_event https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azolla_event We already have condensed carbon - in the ground, stable, in the form of coal, natural gas, and oil. We need to just stop digging it out and burning it. There's really no getting around the need for a direct and transparent price on carbon. The health benefits from lower air pollution alone would probably pay for the transition itself. For example, at just about $15/tonne, coal is immediately dead (doubled in price) as an electricity source: https://www.resources.org/common-resources/calculating-various-fuel-prices-under-a-carbon-tax/ https://www.resources.org/common-resources/calculating-vario... Whereas current techniques are coming in at about $500/tonne for CO2 removal.
randomopining 5y ago
Both can be done at the same time lol! Realistically those populations are gonna grow at a crazy rate. Every country needs to adopt a minimal growth rate and be rewarded for being sustainable.
ArkanExplorer 5y ago
Per-capita CO2 usage is not really a relevant measure. What matters a lot more is CO2 efficiency. That can be determined by CO2 per unit of GDP, and CO2 per scientific article. For example, Pakistan has about the same level of scientific output as Slovakia [1], and 28x the GDP. Pakistan's population is 40x that of Slovakia. Slovakia's per-capita CO2 output is 7.1 tonnes, vs Pakistan 0.87 tonnes. But actually, per unit of CO2, Slovakia is substantially more efficient than Pakistan in terms of economic and scientific output: Slovakia is 4.9x more efficient than Pakistan at scientific output per unit of CO2, and 1.8x as efficient for GDP. You can see similar things across the world when comparing highly efficient Western countries to inefficient 2nd and 3rd world countries. But its true that Western countries must decarbonise electricity generation and transport, and then support/force others to do the same. [1] https://www.natureindex.com/country-outputs/generate/All/global/All/score https://www.natureindex.com/country-outputs/generate/All/glo... This is why cap and trade systems are much less fair than a global carbon tax. Countries, individuals, businesses should be able to emit CO2 if they think that the return is justified against the cost. Meanwhile, low-value and inefficient output should be eliminated as much as possible.
- amrocha 5y ago
  You're assuming that GDP and papers per CO2 emitted are good measures of efficiency, and therefore of what are good uses of CO2. This is a false assumption. The reason African countries don't produce as many papers is not that they're less "efficient" than anyone else, it's the geopolitical history of the region. Likewise for GDP. I wanted to comment on what you said about a global carbon tax for countries, individuals and businesses though. I really don't think that's a good way to go. I'm assuming you mean a significant carbon tax, because a small tax wouldn't do much in the time we need it to. A carbon tax for corporations banks everything on the hope that it will be profitable to move away from fossil fuels in the near future. The cost of failure is a catastrophic global crisis. How do you financially factor that in? How much profit does an activity need to generate for it to be worth causing a global catastrophe? The cost is immeasurable, so you can't put a price on it. Not to mention you might create perverse incentives. An oil company might decide it's financially worth it to emit tons of CO2, pay a fine, cause sea levels to rise, and then corner the market on building inland. There is literally no monetary value that justifies the trajectory we're on. For individuals, a significant carbon tax means rich people get to emit CO2, and poor people don't. Rich people get to sail on their yachts, and poor people starve because they have to pay more for food. At a national scale, it's even worse. Rich countries that got rich off of fossil fuels get to keep emitting CO2 as they see fit. Poor countries that were exploited by the rich countries for slaves or resources have to beg for help. Legislative solutions don't have any of these problem. Ban yachts. Subsidize food. Ban cars. Stop oil extraction. Build public transit. Decrease meat production. Embargo countries that keep emitting CO2. Yeah, these are hard things to do, but they're the only thing we can reliably do. Taking the awful system that got us to where we're at today, adding incentives around it to fix it, and hoping that it works well enough within 10 years so that we don't drive ourselves to extinction is not a good plan. I personally think the economic system we have today is inherently unfixable, but even if you think there is a way of using it for good, are you willing to bet the Earth that we'll find the right configuration for it in time to stop global catastrophe? I wouldn't take that bet
prvc 5y ago
In almost all countries in the global North, the pop. growth rate is already far below replacement. There's nothing nefarious, contrary to your insinuation, about focusing on populations that are actually increasing.

culopatin 5y ago

Why don’t we just limit it all around? Why does someone need to have 4 kids which then, in rich countries, forces them to get a bigger car, use more energy, cool a bigger home, etc.

julienb_sea 5y ago
You don't need to limit it, as quality of life increases people have less children. Population growth rate is on a steady decline worldwide, and has or will plateau in developed countries in the near future.
ArkanExplorer 5y ago
Just implement carbon taxes based on the cost of removing CO2 from the atmosphere (probably $200-$500/tonne). This is going to mean about a 5-10% cost of living increase for the typical Westerner - affordable, and beneficial because it will also mean much less air pollution. It would also mean that the 2nd/3rd world would build up with renewable energy and electric transport from the ground up, instead of with fossil fuel infrastructure which will be difficult to replace.
- twobitshifter 5y ago
  It’s a nice idea, but all consumption taxes are unpopular and federal tax revenues are just thrown into one big pile. Can we just spend a trillion a year to remove the CO2 instead?
  - ArkanExplorer 5y ago
    CO2 removal (and storage) at scale is impossible. We would basically have to recreate the Azolla event: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azolla_event https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azolla_event We already have condensed carbon - in the ground, stable, in the form of coal, natural gas, and oil. We need to just stop digging it out and burning it. There's really no getting around the need for a direct and transparent price on carbon. The health benefits from lower air pollution alone would probably pay for the transition itself. For example, at just about $15/tonne, coal is immediately dead (doubled in price) as an electricity source: https://www.resources.org/common-resources/calculating-various-fuel-prices-under-a-carbon-tax/ https://www.resources.org/common-resources/calculating-vario... Whereas current techniques are coming in at about $500/tonne for CO2 removal.

randomopining 5y ago

Both can be done at the same time lol! Realistically those populations are gonna grow at a crazy rate. Every country needs to adopt a minimal growth rate and be rewarded for being sustainable.

ArkanExplorer 5y ago

Per-capita CO2 usage is not really a relevant measure. What matters a lot more is CO2 efficiency. That can be determined by CO2 per unit of GDP, and CO2 per scientific article. For example, Pakistan has about the same level of scientific output as Slovakia [1], and 28x the GDP. Pakistan's population is 40x that of Slovakia. Slovakia's per-capita CO2 output is 7.1 tonnes, vs Pakistan 0.87 tonnes. But actually, per unit of CO2, Slovakia is substantially more efficient than Pakistan in terms of economic and scientific output: Slovakia is 4.9x more efficient than Pakistan at scientific output per unit of CO2, and 1.8x as efficient for GDP. You can see similar things across the world when comparing highly efficient Western countries to inefficient 2nd and 3rd world countries. But its true that Western countries must decarbonise electricity generation and transport, and then support/force others to do the same. [1] https://www.natureindex.com/country-outputs/generate/All/global/All/score https://www.natureindex.com/country-outputs/generate/All/glo... This is why cap and trade systems are much less fair than a global carbon tax. Countries, individuals, businesses should be able to emit CO2 if they think that the return is justified against the cost. Meanwhile, low-value and inefficient output should be eliminated as much as possible.

amrocha 5y ago
You're assuming that GDP and papers per CO2 emitted are good measures of efficiency, and therefore of what are good uses of CO2. This is a false assumption. The reason African countries don't produce as many papers is not that they're less "efficient" than anyone else, it's the geopolitical history of the region. Likewise for GDP. I wanted to comment on what you said about a global carbon tax for countries, individuals and businesses though. I really don't think that's a good way to go. I'm assuming you mean a significant carbon tax, because a small tax wouldn't do much in the time we need it to. A carbon tax for corporations banks everything on the hope that it will be profitable to move away from fossil fuels in the near future. The cost of failure is a catastrophic global crisis. How do you financially factor that in? How much profit does an activity need to generate for it to be worth causing a global catastrophe? The cost is immeasurable, so you can't put a price on it. Not to mention you might create perverse incentives. An oil company might decide it's financially worth it to emit tons of CO2, pay a fine, cause sea levels to rise, and then corner the market on building inland. There is literally no monetary value that justifies the trajectory we're on. For individuals, a significant carbon tax means rich people get to emit CO2, and poor people don't. Rich people get to sail on their yachts, and poor people starve because they have to pay more for food. At a national scale, it's even worse. Rich countries that got rich off of fossil fuels get to keep emitting CO2 as they see fit. Poor countries that were exploited by the rich countries for slaves or resources have to beg for help. Legislative solutions don't have any of these problem. Ban yachts. Subsidize food. Ban cars. Stop oil extraction. Build public transit. Decrease meat production. Embargo countries that keep emitting CO2. Yeah, these are hard things to do, but they're the only thing we can reliably do. Taking the awful system that got us to where we're at today, adding incentives around it to fix it, and hoping that it works well enough within 10 years so that we don't drive ourselves to extinction is not a good plan. I personally think the economic system we have today is inherently unfixable, but even if you think there is a way of using it for good, are you willing to bet the Earth that we'll find the right configuration for it in time to stop global catastrophe? I wouldn't take that bet

prvc 5y ago

In almost all countries in the global North, the pop. growth rate is already far below replacement. There's nothing nefarious, contrary to your insinuation, about focusing on populations that are actually increasing.