Arguments of that form set up a dichotomy of “return to the Bronze Age, or do nothing.” They are part of why nothing has been done about climate change. The fo

Arguments of that form set up a dichotomy of “return to the Bronze Age, or do nothing.” They are part of why nothing has been done about climate change. The fossil fuel industry wants you to believe that decarbonizing a modern economy is impossible. They want their product to be absolutely essential and irreplaceable. Oil is irreplaceable (with current technology) to a very limited extent, but plastics and petrochemicals account for less than 10% of all oil consumption. Aviation is also less than 10%. Cars account for the majority of all oil use. We should be able to cut oil use to 25% of the current total with no deep changes to our standard of living. It’s even more extreme for coal. Only a tiny percentage of coal is used for metallurgy. Almost all of it goes to electricity production.