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A higher temperature than what we want is almost a given. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/01/climate-optimism-is-an-illusion-un-chief-tells-co
by melling 5y ago
A higher temperature than what we want is almost a given.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/01/climate-optimism-is-an-illusion-un-chief-tells-cop26 https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/nov/01/climate-...
China is talking 2060 for net zero.
India is talking 2070:
https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/live/2021/nov/01/cop26-begins-world-leaders-glasgow-climate-crisis-live https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/live/2021/nov/01/cop...
The United States is claiming by 2050 but there seems to be no actual political ability to meet that.
- BurningFrog 5y agoPoliticians "committing" to things that will happen after they are out of office, are mostly just saying pretty words.
- munk-a 5y agoIt's definitely tough to have confidence in these sorts of statements - but I just wish we'd get beyond the people who actively fight against even the probably empty promises.
- throwaway894345 5y agoI do too, but I think that “empty promises” empower them. I also agree with Andrew Sullivan (https://andrewsullivan.substack.com/p/how-to-turn-the-gop-green-dae https://andrewsullivan.substack.com/p/how-to-turn-the-gop-gr...) that conservatives could be persuaded to support climate initiatives if we on the left allow ourselves to prioritize climate above our own tribalism tendencies (those who would reply, “But conservatives aren’t prioritizing climate over tribalism” are missing the point entirely).
- munk-a 5y agoI would say, that in America at least, flip-flopping is only viewed as an insult by conservatives though. People criticized Biden over his busing policies during the election, but nobody critized the fact that he changed his mind on the topic, people discussed how he "grew". I know there are extremist pockets on both sides of the aisle - but I don't think the majority of liberals would really prefer a gotcha "I told you so" moment over actually getting meaningful policies done. I've always viewed it more as an unfortunate coincidence[1] that social conservatism was so closely tied to climate change denial. In theory those folks wanting to make sure their children can hunt and hike like they did growing up should be strongly set in favour of preserving an environment where that remains a possibility. Instead we have the media pushing this shallow form of conservatism where we specifically want to preserve the unsustainable post-war boom years where every river had a paper mill on it, every driveway had two cars (except they didn't and they weren't SUVs) and nobody realized what the consequences of that were. How do you overcome conservative media when it's pushing such a strong agenda? Inviting them over for tea isn't going to cause a sea-change. 1. Sorta - I think some folks worked hard to make sure this happened.
- RickJWagner 5y agoHard to feel guilty about energy usage when the politicians arriving for the summit all arrive by private jet. Even the loudest politicians usually maintain 3 or 4 homes, often with heated swimming pools. I'm a bit tired of the extreme hypocrisy. If someone like Jimmy Carter or Ralph Nader (they both live humble lives) were to be the leading voice, I'd feel better about things.
- throwaway894345 5y agoThis isn’t hypocrisy. The message from the leaders isn’t “we all need to do our part to emit less carbon”—that kind of personal responsibility approach isn’t going to work. We need to stop subsidizing carbon so that people’s economic interests are aligned with the interests of our planet. We need to solve this systemically.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago> in America at least, flip-flopping is only viewed as an insult by conservatives though. People criticized Biden over his busing policies during the election, but nobody critized the fact that he changed his mind on the topic, people discussed how he "grew" Both parties are tolerant of drift. Donald Trump wasn't always a Republican.
- munk-a 5y agoTrump is really weird for a number of reasons. He broke the mold in a significant way from the more traditional conservative politician so I'm not certain if he's that good of an example. I'm trying to avoid "no true scotsman"ing but Trump really was a pretty big contrast to most other republicans.
- LargoLasskhyfv 5y agoWhat then? A real estate developer like described in: [DaDa] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riverside_South,_Manhattan#Television_City https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riverside_South,_Manhattan#Tel... ?
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- bcrosby95 5y agoThe article doesn't support your characterization of it. Nuclear isn't rejected by the left because of tribalism, as you seem to imply. It is rejected for other reasons, completely unrelated to tribalism, as the article points out. And many on the right reject nuclear for the exact same reasons.
- throwaway894345 5y agoMy comment doesn't support your characterization of it. :) My original remark was about rising above tribalism for sake of the environment. I was specifically thinking about the line in the article: > Climate is simply too important to be sacrificed to cultural prejudices.
- wongarsu 5y agoEven worse, most of these "commitments" are for after the politician's death. Xi Jingping isn't particularly old for a politician with his 68 years, but by the time 2060 rolls around he would be 107 years old.
- parenthesis 5y agoI really wish the Queen (who is 95) would say to the world leaders: "it really is your problem: you might live to my age!"
- xienze 5y ago> Politicians "committing" to things that will happen after they are out of office, are mostly just saying pretty words. And these same politicians are taking private jets and massive motorcades to summits when there's a much more carbon footprint-friendly alternative available (hint: we've all been doing it for the last 18 months). They tell us we're "past the point of no return" w.r.t. sea levels rising to the point that some large percentage of our coastal cities will be underwater, yet haven't started building sea walls to at least attempt to prevent the flooding. And these same politicians are hellbent on importing unlimited numbers of third world immigrants into first world countries, instantly elevating the carbon footprint of those people. All while telling Joe Blow in the first world that he should stop having children, think of the carbon footprint they're producing! How could you be so selfish! This is why I don't take this stuff seriously. We get lectured about carbon footprint this and "past the point of no return" that by people doing the complete opposite of what should be done to reduce carbon footprint or try to mitigate the disaster that we're too late to prevent.
- pmorici 5y agoIf your are counting on politicians to save us you will probably be disappointed. The solution will almost certainly be market based.
- kelnos 5y agoWe really are doomed, then. As long as we allow companies to externalize climate costs (which requires political decisions in order to change), there will be no reason for the market to care... at least not until it's too late to care.
- gameswithgo 5y agoI the book "Collapse", it gives a survey of dozens of civilizations tackling problems like this and how they did, or didn't, solve them. There are many cases each of market or grassroots based solutions and top down government based solutions. My conclusion from this empirical evidence is that there are many ways to arrive at solutions, what is important is that someone makes it happen. Anyone claiming that only government, or only free markets can do it, is probably wrong.
- pmorici 5y agoMy comment should be read as an observation on the current state of things not an absolute statement of universal truth.
- yongjik 5y agoWell, that's what "market leaders" have been paying the politicians to say for decades. It would be nice if a market-based solution could save the day, but the market can only go so far while politicians ignore externalities.
- pmorici 5y agoThey could start by eliminating all subsidies for oil and gas exploration until that happens government is part of the problem.
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- 908B64B197 5y agoWhen you look at who's polluting and who's emissions are on an upward trajectory, there's one obvious country that's actively working against the environment. China's emissions aren't slowing down. Coal is incredibly cheap when there's no carbon tax or emission standards. One of the many reasons it's cheaper to manufacture in China and why North Americans and Europeans can't compete [0]. Comparing the US[1] and China[2], the US has: - Decreasing per capita emissions in the US starting in 1973 (-27%) - A decrease in the countries emission starting in 2007 (-13%) Meanwhile for the same period China has had - a 7x increase per capita since 1973 (+532%) - 48% increase for its global emissions since 2007 So it is possible to drastically reduce our carbon footprint thanks to innovation and smarter power generation. Time to add tariffs on goods produced by states who made the decision of going all-in on polluting power generation, and potentially apply immigration quotas to citizens of these countries. [0] https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/26/us-leads-greenhouse-gas-emissions-on-a-per-capita-basis-report-finds.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/26/us-leads-greenhouse-gas-emis... [1] https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/united-states https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/united-states [2] https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china
- tomarr 5y agoDeveloped country is developed Developing country is developing I would say your viewpoint there is overly simplistic.
- VBprogrammer 5y agoI think your comment is a bit too glib; your point though I think is entirely correct. You can't compare the average living standard in China to the US and claim bad faith on their part.
- lordnacho 5y agoIt's hard to blame this on China. After all, they make a lot of the stuff we want in the west. And they make is precisely because we don't want to make it here, and because we don't want to face choices like which of our own rivers to pollute, or which of our own factories needs relaxed safety standards.
- purple_ferret 5y agoI don't understand countries like India. Do they think the west is going to bail them out when Delhi is baking at 55 C every summer? The US i can understand. It's arguably set to be relatively impacted least.
- lotsofpulp 5y agoThe leaders' kids should be able to make it out to somewhere least impacted.
- r00fus 5y agoNo, the politicians expect to be out of office or dead by the time their commitments either come to pass or (more likely) it becomes clear those commitments will never work. It's a shell game to them, and they have exit plans.
- aidenn0 5y agoDo the politicians not plan on having grandchildren?
- LeifCarrotson 5y agoThey probably don't plan on having poor grandchildren.
- IggleSniggle 5y agoThey expect to have grandchildren that are sufficiently powerful enough to choose their own geography.
- UncleOxidant 5y agoWhen the glaciers in the Himalayas have melted they're going to be hurting for water.
- Kavelach 5y agoIt's simple - the majority of the population lives in awful circumstances and to allow them to live in better conditions, you have to generate a lot of emissions.
- pault 5y agoA government committing to emissions reduction is like your deadbeat sibling committing to pay you back next Tuesday.
- beebmam 5y ago65% of China's energy production is from coal. They're probably even less likely to have the political ability to meet these goals, given how much of the country's infrastructure relies on coal for basic functioning (like even home heating).
- gameswithgo 5y agoWhether your primary source of electricity is coal, or natural gas, you face very nearly the same problem, and China has a much more powerful central government that can dictate radical change than the USA, if they choose to do so.
- emkoemko 5y agoyea their change is to force coal producers to limit price and to increase production, unban Australian coal and buy more.... plus buy a massive amount of LNG from the USA... China is increasing its carbon output while still having to massively ration electricity... not so sure if they are taking this so seriously nor the world.
- kelnos 5y agoIsn't it much easier in China? Obviously they can't change things overnight, but Xi just has to decree that getting on renewables is the top priority, and it'd get done. Or is there something particularly thorny about this that could cause massive civil unrest if he were to take that step?
- emkoemko 5y agoyea with China's energy crisis problem its increasing coal production and consumption.. plus a massive increase in LNG
- sokoloff 5y agoI wonder how much of the Bitcoin ban was electric production related and how much was economic control related. As China continues to modernize and become more energy-intensive, that power has to come from somewhere. If he bans coal too early or restricts it too much, progress that the people saw happening and intensely want could slow dramatically. People will follow a strong dictator as long as they don’t see a much better path. If they see a much better path, support will wane quickly and possibly in an ugly fashion.
- buckie 5y agoOne of my current concerns is that the demonization of climate scientists over the last 30 years has resulted in models that underestimate the timelines of how bad things get. Not an intentional conspiracy or anything, just a systemic natural response to the pressure of not wanting to be raked across the coals in the media as the "crazy". As an example, the heat wave in the northwest of the USA and Canada this year was something I remember reading about as a problem to expect ~2050. Ditto for Siberia this year. Ditto for the snow in Sao Paolo. I hope my concerns are misguided. I general though, short of a deus ex machina, I have no hope for the world doing anything about the climate emergency, even after it's obviously too late and even after the worlds seen a major city burned/wet bulbed/typhooned off the map.
- lbebber 5y agoThere was no snow in São Paulo AFAIK; and snow in the south of Brazil, which did happen, happens more or less yearly. (just a minor correction, not arguing against your general point)
- buckie 5y agoI can't cite that example, I just have a friend whose parents are there tell me a story about how they were saying how pretty the snow flurries were and how he had to inform them about how ominous it was for there to be snow there. It's possible that they were referring to the frost that Sao Paolo got (which is still pretty crazy), and the videos of snow from further south.
- buu700 5y agoTIL the term "wet-bulb temperature": https://www.iflscience.com/environment/why-is-everybody-talking-about-wet-bulb-temperatures https://www.iflscience.com/environment/why-is-everybody-talk... tl;dr: It's essentially just a humidity-adjusted temperature, like wind chill factor for hot weather. The important figure to know is that a wet-bulb temperature of 35°C / 95°F (equivalent to that temperature at 100% humidity, or higher temperatures with lower humidities) will kill everyone. This makes me wonder if it is (or will become) economical for cities to use renewable energy to dehumidify the outdoors, and if so whether the yield of water would actually be useful.
- RandomLensman 5y agoWhat that really means is that people will try geoengineering to reduce the temperature, absorb CO2, or block sunlight. No sure why this is always assumed to not happen. This will come with its own risks, but at the time in future when this is done, the risk-reward characteristics might not be so bad.
- esarbe 5y agoYeah, that's what I'm really afraid off. By the time the shit hits the fan, everyone will be so desperate, they will try everything. I'm pretty sure that kind of techo-utopian fantasy is part of the reason why people are so reluctant to face the problem we have. To think that there will be some Deus Ex Machina that saves us all, without us having to actually do the hards things is just too tempting.
- inkywatcher 5y agoIt is absolutely taken as a given, especially in discussions involving people who might make money from such projects.
- VintageCool 5y agoI think that we will just mentally adjust and adapt to the suffering. If people in Bangladesh are losing their farms to flooding because of global warming, then voters in Kansas will simply... not care.
- flavius29663 5y agoThere was no net zero commitment from the US, yet it has reduced it's per capita emissions to 1960s levels. https://datacommons.org/tools/timeline#place=country%2FUSA&statsVar=Amount_Emissions_CarbonDioxide_PerCapita&chart=%7B%22amount%22%3A%7B%22delta%22%3Afalse%2C%22pc%22%3Afalse%7D%7D https://datacommons.org/tools/timeline#place=country%2FUSA&s... There is enough public pressure to make even more changes, and the CO2 intensity will keep going down regardless if it's Bush, Obama, Trump or Biden in office.
- esarbe 5y agoAnd it's still number one per capita. There's a long way to go and no laurels to rest on.
- nradov 5y agoSome of that reduction in per capita emissions came from outsourcing low-end manufacturing to foreign countries. Our per capita numbers don't look as good once you net out the impact of imports and exports.