5 ms·

If you think it's good to cut consumption, it seems like we have a lot of other places to reduce energy consumption outside of more basic necessity energy usage

If you think it's good to cut consumption, it seems like we have a lot of other places to reduce energy consumption outside of more basic necessity energy usage, like heating people's homes. This perspective just externalizes side effects of all sorts of unequal societal resource allotments and paints the problem contributor as the average person. It's akin to blaming climate change on your average person when the biggest contributors aren't your typical person whose biggest crimes might be driving to work, taking an occasional mass shared flight, or ordering something on Amazon. Or plastic waste on consumers not recycling. There's lots of these blame deflecting trends from industry. In the long term, you might be correct that we need to reduce energy expenditure (although birth rates could change this picture), but I'd say we have a lot of other low hanging wasteful consumption fruit that we should fix before having people shiver to stay warm in their homes.

sokoloff 4y ago
Many (most?) of these things are not either-or. I can stop watering my lawn in a drought and ask industry to improve their water efficiency. I can turn my thermostat and flow temps down a few degrees and expect companies to reduce unused lighting in their offices on nights and weekends.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
gruez 4y ago
>It's akin to blaming climate change on your average person when the biggest contributors aren't your typical person whose biggest crimes might be driving to work, taking an occasional mass shared flight, or ordering something on Amazon Who's the biggest contributor then, corporations? If I order something from amazon, which causes emissions to be created because of the delivery truck, is that amazon's fault and not mine?
- moring 4y ago
  As an individual, I don't even have knowledge, let alone control about the energy consumption over the production process of things I order. It won't improve anything to put responsibility for that consumption on the buyer, at least not without significant changes that could better be solved by putting an appropriate price tag on consumption. And that last part doesn't just mean to make things more expensive, which causes inflation and doesn't really make things more expensive. It means to reward saving energy compared to other costs. Asking who is to blame is -- suprise! -- not solving anything.
  - gruez 4y ago
    >As an individual, I don't even have knowledge, let alone control about the energy consumption over the production process of things I order. It won't improve anything to put responsibility for that consumption on the buyer, at least not without significant changes that could better be solved by putting an appropriate price tag on consumption. But at the end of the day, the buyer is always right. It's easy to abdicate responsibility of production based carbon emissions to the producers, but if your buying choices actively disadvantage producers with lower carbon emissions (eg. because they cost more and you only care about costs) why would you expect producers to do anything about it? >It means to reward saving energy compared to other costs. Isn't there already an incentive to save energy? It's a cost, so businesses are already incentivized to save energy wherever they can. Higher prices incentivizes that even more.
  - willnonya 4y ago
    The original comment wasn't about assigning blame but allowing market forces to work to balance supply and demand. The prices are how you, as an individual, gain knowledge about the energy market. Prices are high and demand out straps supply. Prices are low and supply is higher than demand. Subsidies distort this information. This isnt to say it's good that people can't heat their homes but it's the only way to balance these markets. Any solution that focuses on the consumer side relief rather than improving supply will only exacerbate the situation.
- bmj 4y ago
  I believe corporations are effectively supporting campaigns to push the burden of climate guilt on consumers. That isn't to say that the average citizen shouldn't be aware of (and seek to change) their patterns of consumption, but if most people are too busy scrupulously examining whether reusable shopping bags are better for the environment than plastic, well, no one notices the massive effect that global consumer product shipping (facilitated by Amazon) has on the environment. That said, environmental scrupulosity is a thing. Would it be better for the environment if I didn't buy stuff from Amazon, and maybe just bought locally made goods and food? And maybe I shouldn't buy new clothes, but just continually repair what I have? And maybe I shouldn't use computers or smartphones because the raw materials are damaging to extract from the Earth? But, to answer your question, I think we can most effectively blame an economic system that rewards continuous production and consumption, with emphasis on disposable, rather than repairable, items. Amazon helps facilitate that with free shipping and impossibly low prices. Yet, instead of asking us, as consumers, to reexamine our habits of consumption, we are asked to feel guilty about how much we recycle, or how much we drive. I could not own a car, and walk everywhere, but if I purchase nearly everything I need from Amazon, I suspect my "environmental impact" is no different from a person who drives to work everyday. [Edit: formatting]
  - gruez 4y ago
    >but if most people are too busy scrupulously examining whether reusable shopping bags are better for the environment than plastic, well, no one notices the massive effect that global consumer product shipping (facilitated by Amazon) has on the environment. This feels like a non-issue to me. If you're the kind of person who's "scrupulously examining whether reusable shopping bags are better for the environment", I doubt you're going to forget that ordering stuff from amazon involves a ship traveling half way across the world. >But, to answer your question, I think we can most effectively blame an economic system that rewards continuous production and consumption, with emphasis on disposable, rather than repairable, items. But is the economic system actually incentivizing disposable stuff in particular, or is it incentivizing producing what consumers want? The fact that amazon is strewn with "reusable" variants of everything imaginable (eg. reusable straws, reusable bags, reusable k-cups) makes me think it's the latter. > Amazon helps facilitate that with free shipping and impossibly low prices. Maybe the prices are indication of something? For something like straws, it might actually be better to manufacture 1 gram worth of plastic and ship it across the world, than it is to wash/sanitize a reusable straw which also involve labor and resources (eg. hot water). >we are asked to feel guilty about how much we recycle, or how much we drive. I could not own a car, and walk everywhere, but if I purchase nearly everything I need from Amazon, I suspect my "environmental impact" is no different from a person who drives to work everyday. I don't understand what you're trying to say here. If you don't own a car, then presumably you're not driving to work. If you don't driving to work, that's one less thing that's contributing to environmental impact. Of course, if you're ordering stuff from amazon rather than going to a store, that loss might be offset by your amazon deliveries, but I suspect that you're still coming out ahead. The fact that the alternatives have environmental impact as well shouldn't come as a surprise either. After all, maintaining a first world standard of living is going to have some environmental impact associated with it, and it's unreasonable to expect otherwise.
- politelemon 4y ago
  It is strange to assume an either/or, which is an unhelpful polarising stance to take. The answer can be both.
- SkeuomorphicBee 4y ago
  The corporation have the decision making power over the emissions. Knowledge of emissions is abstracted away by this middle man, and the relevant decisions are already made by the time the product is available to the customer, leaving the customer with only the binary fake decision of buying-in to all hight emissions decisions of the corp, or going without.
- yucky 4y ago
  > Who's the biggest contributor then, corporations? The US military.
- shagie 4y ago
  > > ... or ordering something on Amazon. > Who's the biggest contributor then, corporations? If I order something from amazon, which causes emissions to be created because of the delivery truck, is that amazon's fault and not mine? It's even a harder question than that. Sure, Amazon is the one responsible for scheduling the emissions... but when you take into account the overall emissions of a purchase then it gets more interesting. --- https://ctl.mit.edu/sites/default/files/library/public/Dimitri-Weideli-Environmental-Analysis-of-US-Online-Shopping_0.pdf https://ctl.mit.edu/sites/default/files/library/public/Dimit... > Results are shown for the buying process of a toy, for customers living in an urban area. Figure 1 shows the carbon footprint of online and traditional shopping, when only the purchase step and the appropriate return rate are considered. The Cybernaut tends to have a lower environmental impact than the Traditional Shopper, as long as he does not use speed delivery. > ... > The Cybernaut’s carbon footprint is almost two times smaller than a Traditional Shopper. In fact the main component of the Traditional shopper is the customer transportation, whereas Cybernaut‘s emissions are linked to a parcel carrier, who uses an optimized delivery process. The freight transportation has a bigger impact for the Cybernaut since the item is packaged individually, which increases packaging weight and volume, and the linehaul distance of online warehouse is bigger than a traditional one. The packaging is the main component of the Cybernaut’s carbon footprint. --- The box that you get from Amazon is the largest part of the carbon footprint for the online shopper, but it is still much less than the traditional shopper driving to buy an item in a store. The difference between an individual driving to the store and parcel delivery is akin to similar arguments for solo commuters vs taking public transportation - the bulk transportation of items or people is better.
jason-phillips 4y ago
> paints the problem contributor as the average person I'm confused, it's not?
jkepler 4y ago
Rather than reducing birth rates (which would mean less creative problem-solvers to care for the climate and the broader natural world and human cultures), in the long term we ought to increase energy production. Abundant affordable energy, produced sustainably, will help everyone, especially the poor.

sokoloff 4y ago

Many (most?) of these things are not either-or. I can stop watering my lawn in a drought and ask industry to improve their water efficiency. I can turn my thermostat and flow temps down a few degrees and expect companies to reduce unused lighting in their offices on nights and weekends.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

gruez 4y ago

>It's akin to blaming climate change on your average person when the biggest contributors aren't your typical person whose biggest crimes might be driving to work, taking an occasional mass shared flight, or ordering something on Amazon Who's the biggest contributor then, corporations? If I order something from amazon, which causes emissions to be created because of the delivery truck, is that amazon's fault and not mine?

moring 4y ago
As an individual, I don't even have knowledge, let alone control about the energy consumption over the production process of things I order. It won't improve anything to put responsibility for that consumption on the buyer, at least not without significant changes that could better be solved by putting an appropriate price tag on consumption. And that last part doesn't just mean to make things more expensive, which causes inflation and doesn't really make things more expensive. It means to reward saving energy compared to other costs. Asking who is to blame is -- suprise! -- not solving anything.
- gruez 4y ago
  >As an individual, I don't even have knowledge, let alone control about the energy consumption over the production process of things I order. It won't improve anything to put responsibility for that consumption on the buyer, at least not without significant changes that could better be solved by putting an appropriate price tag on consumption. But at the end of the day, the buyer is always right. It's easy to abdicate responsibility of production based carbon emissions to the producers, but if your buying choices actively disadvantage producers with lower carbon emissions (eg. because they cost more and you only care about costs) why would you expect producers to do anything about it? >It means to reward saving energy compared to other costs. Isn't there already an incentive to save energy? It's a cost, so businesses are already incentivized to save energy wherever they can. Higher prices incentivizes that even more.
- willnonya 4y ago
  The original comment wasn't about assigning blame but allowing market forces to work to balance supply and demand. The prices are how you, as an individual, gain knowledge about the energy market. Prices are high and demand out straps supply. Prices are low and supply is higher than demand. Subsidies distort this information. This isnt to say it's good that people can't heat their homes but it's the only way to balance these markets. Any solution that focuses on the consumer side relief rather than improving supply will only exacerbate the situation.
bmj 4y ago
I believe corporations are effectively supporting campaigns to push the burden of climate guilt on consumers. That isn't to say that the average citizen shouldn't be aware of (and seek to change) their patterns of consumption, but if most people are too busy scrupulously examining whether reusable shopping bags are better for the environment than plastic, well, no one notices the massive effect that global consumer product shipping (facilitated by Amazon) has on the environment. That said, environmental scrupulosity is a thing. Would it be better for the environment if I didn't buy stuff from Amazon, and maybe just bought locally made goods and food? And maybe I shouldn't buy new clothes, but just continually repair what I have? And maybe I shouldn't use computers or smartphones because the raw materials are damaging to extract from the Earth? But, to answer your question, I think we can most effectively blame an economic system that rewards continuous production and consumption, with emphasis on disposable, rather than repairable, items. Amazon helps facilitate that with free shipping and impossibly low prices. Yet, instead of asking us, as consumers, to reexamine our habits of consumption, we are asked to feel guilty about how much we recycle, or how much we drive. I could not own a car, and walk everywhere, but if I purchase nearly everything I need from Amazon, I suspect my "environmental impact" is no different from a person who drives to work everyday. [Edit: formatting]
- gruez 4y ago
  >but if most people are too busy scrupulously examining whether reusable shopping bags are better for the environment than plastic, well, no one notices the massive effect that global consumer product shipping (facilitated by Amazon) has on the environment. This feels like a non-issue to me. If you're the kind of person who's "scrupulously examining whether reusable shopping bags are better for the environment", I doubt you're going to forget that ordering stuff from amazon involves a ship traveling half way across the world. >But, to answer your question, I think we can most effectively blame an economic system that rewards continuous production and consumption, with emphasis on disposable, rather than repairable, items. But is the economic system actually incentivizing disposable stuff in particular, or is it incentivizing producing what consumers want? The fact that amazon is strewn with "reusable" variants of everything imaginable (eg. reusable straws, reusable bags, reusable k-cups) makes me think it's the latter. > Amazon helps facilitate that with free shipping and impossibly low prices. Maybe the prices are indication of something? For something like straws, it might actually be better to manufacture 1 gram worth of plastic and ship it across the world, than it is to wash/sanitize a reusable straw which also involve labor and resources (eg. hot water). >we are asked to feel guilty about how much we recycle, or how much we drive. I could not own a car, and walk everywhere, but if I purchase nearly everything I need from Amazon, I suspect my "environmental impact" is no different from a person who drives to work everyday. I don't understand what you're trying to say here. If you don't own a car, then presumably you're not driving to work. If you don't driving to work, that's one less thing that's contributing to environmental impact. Of course, if you're ordering stuff from amazon rather than going to a store, that loss might be offset by your amazon deliveries, but I suspect that you're still coming out ahead. The fact that the alternatives have environmental impact as well shouldn't come as a surprise either. After all, maintaining a first world standard of living is going to have some environmental impact associated with it, and it's unreasonable to expect otherwise.
politelemon 4y ago
It is strange to assume an either/or, which is an unhelpful polarising stance to take. The answer can be both.
SkeuomorphicBee 4y ago
The corporation have the decision making power over the emissions. Knowledge of emissions is abstracted away by this middle man, and the relevant decisions are already made by the time the product is available to the customer, leaving the customer with only the binary fake decision of buying-in to all hight emissions decisions of the corp, or going without.
yucky 4y ago
> Who's the biggest contributor then, corporations? The US military.
shagie 4y ago
> > ... or ordering something on Amazon. > Who's the biggest contributor then, corporations? If I order something from amazon, which causes emissions to be created because of the delivery truck, is that amazon's fault and not mine? It's even a harder question than that. Sure, Amazon is the one responsible for scheduling the emissions... but when you take into account the overall emissions of a purchase then it gets more interesting. --- https://ctl.mit.edu/sites/default/files/library/public/Dimitri-Weideli-Environmental-Analysis-of-US-Online-Shopping_0.pdf https://ctl.mit.edu/sites/default/files/library/public/Dimit... > Results are shown for the buying process of a toy, for customers living in an urban area. Figure 1 shows the carbon footprint of online and traditional shopping, when only the purchase step and the appropriate return rate are considered. The Cybernaut tends to have a lower environmental impact than the Traditional Shopper, as long as he does not use speed delivery. > ... > The Cybernaut’s carbon footprint is almost two times smaller than a Traditional Shopper. In fact the main component of the Traditional shopper is the customer transportation, whereas Cybernaut‘s emissions are linked to a parcel carrier, who uses an optimized delivery process. The freight transportation has a bigger impact for the Cybernaut since the item is packaged individually, which increases packaging weight and volume, and the linehaul distance of online warehouse is bigger than a traditional one. The packaging is the main component of the Cybernaut’s carbon footprint. --- The box that you get from Amazon is the largest part of the carbon footprint for the online shopper, but it is still much less than the traditional shopper driving to buy an item in a store. The difference between an individual driving to the store and parcel delivery is akin to similar arguments for solo commuters vs taking public transportation - the bulk transportation of items or people is better.

jason-phillips 4y ago

> paints the problem contributor as the average person I'm confused, it's not?

jkepler 4y ago

Rather than reducing birth rates (which would mean less creative problem-solvers to care for the climate and the broader natural world and human cultures), in the long term we ought to increase energy production. Abundant affordable energy, produced sustainably, will help everyone, especially the poor.