4 ms·

So a country like South Africa can just turn off their coal plants and continue as normal ? Of course not ! They will go bankrupt ! Solar+storage is still too e

by nroets 4y ago

So a country like South Africa can just turn off their coal plants and continue as normal ? Of course not ! They will go bankrupt ! Solar+storage is still too expensive ! Whereas if the US consumer stop buying oversize trucks and stop flying cross country for social events, they will actually save money! It's simply not equatable to expect a poor country like South Africa to make sacrifices while the US (a rich country) refuse to levy a carbon tax.

melling 4y ago
100,000 flights every day of the year globally emit 2% of emissions. I’m not sure why everyone talks about flying. It’s a rounding error. I never realized South Africa was such a big emitter of CO2. It only has 15 coal power plants? https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/south-africa-taken-court-over-plan-new-coal-power-2021-11-17/ https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/south-africa-taken-cour...
- nroets 4y ago
  Yes, flying is just another staw on the camel's back! Methane emission from the oil industry is another "rounding error". By your logic we should just ignore it. The solution is obvious: Just levy a carbon tax and let the markets sort it out.
  - melling 4y ago
    My logic says start with the biggest issues, and the low hanging fruit. Isn’t that the way it’s usually done? “Let’s get everyone in the world to ride a bicycle” What sort of solution is this?
  - nroets 4y ago
    Nationalists and communists have these grand top down views of their economies. The problem is that they ruin a lot of smaller industries in pursuit of their grand vision. Capitalism turned out be be a superior system and it's not top down! The best way to solve this "tragedy of the commons" problem is through a tax where a market system can determine what should be changed. Yes, the article is not a realistic solution, but neither is closing coal plants (without replacing them with something else).
    - eesmith 4y ago
      > through a tax Taxation is also a grand top down view of the economy. You've got to figure out the details of an equitable amount. Do different countries pay different amounts? Are there subsidizes for the poor? Are other greenhouse gases, like nitrous oxide, also included, and at what rate? If someone doesn't pay, how is the tax enforced? All those are part of a grand vision. Just like the grand top down view wherein "nationalists and communists" decided to ban most CFC emissions. And the "nationalists and communists" who decided to ban commercial whaling, outside of a few nations. How would the superior capitalistic system have solved those problems? It's not like the capitalistic system is doing that great a job of preserving commercial fishing. The "Tragedy of the Commons" was based on a fairy-tale interpretation of history. The far greater tragedy occurred due to the commons owners enclosing the land and breaking commoner's rights of use. A.k.a. "capitalism".
      - nroets 4y ago
        Read my post carefully. I'm not saying capitalism will solve the problem. There are many reasonable answers and proposals to these questions. Here's one: https://citizensclimatelobby.org/carbon-pricing-studies/ https://citizensclimatelobby.org/carbon-pricing-studies/ The EU has already placed a price on some emissions: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_Emissions_Trading_System https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_Emissions_Tra... Wikipedia says "In economics and in an ecological context, the tragedy of the commons is a situation in which individual users, who have open access to a resource unhampered by shared social structures or formal rules that govern access and use,[1][2] act independently according to their own self-interest and, contrary to the common good of all users, cause depletion of the resource through their uncoordinated action in case there are too many users related to the available resources". That is not a fairy tale.
        eesmith 4y ago
        That doesn't change the fact that carbon pricing depends on a grand top-down view of the economy - something you seemed to reject. Read more of that Wikipedia article, including "heavily criticized, particularly by anthropologists and historians": > Critical scholars note that although taken as a hypothetical example by Lloyd, the historical demise of the commons of Britain and Europe resulted not from misuse of long-held rights of usage by the commoners, but from the commons' owners enclosing and appropriating the land, abrogating the commoners' rights. as well as the criticism section at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons#Criticism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons#Critici... with: > Radical environmentalist Derrick Jensen claims the tragedy of the commons is used as propaganda for private ownership.[189][190] He says it has been used by the political right wing to hasten the final enclosure of the "common resources" of third world and indigenous people worldwide, as a part of the Washington Consensus and > Tragedy of the commons has served as a pretext for powerful private companies and/or governments to introduce regulatory agents or outsourcing on less powerful entities or governments, for the exploitation of their natural resources.
- dvko 4y ago
  Easy - because it’s a luxury endeavor.
  - melling 4y ago
    Once again… It accomplishes next to nothing. And we certainly don’t want people driving 1000 miles instead of flying If the electricity comes from coal or nuclear, no one would know the difference, except for the cleaner air
    - dvko 4y ago
      You asked why people talk about flying. This is a problem that can’t be solved at just a single angle. > And we certainly don’t want people driving 1000 miles instead of flying Not necessarily true. A single person in a gasoline car, yes, flying is probably slightly less dirty. More than one person in the car? Driving wins.
      - dzhiurgis 4y ago
        Does driving wins because you are orders of magnitude more likely to die while driving?

by nroets 4y ago

melling 4y ago

100,000 flights every day of the year globally emit 2% of emissions. I’m not sure why everyone talks about flying. It’s a rounding error. I never realized South Africa was such a big emitter of CO2. It only has 15 coal power plants? https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/south-africa-taken-court-over-plan-new-coal-power-2021-11-17/ https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/south-africa-taken-cour...

nroets 4y ago
Yes, flying is just another staw on the camel's back! Methane emission from the oil industry is another "rounding error". By your logic we should just ignore it. The solution is obvious: Just levy a carbon tax and let the markets sort it out.
- melling 4y ago
  My logic says start with the biggest issues, and the low hanging fruit. Isn’t that the way it’s usually done? “Let’s get everyone in the world to ride a bicycle” What sort of solution is this?
- nroets 4y ago
  Nationalists and communists have these grand top down views of their economies. The problem is that they ruin a lot of smaller industries in pursuit of their grand vision. Capitalism turned out be be a superior system and it's not top down! The best way to solve this "tragedy of the commons" problem is through a tax where a market system can determine what should be changed. Yes, the article is not a realistic solution, but neither is closing coal plants (without replacing them with something else).
  - eesmith 4y ago
    > through a tax Taxation is also a grand top down view of the economy. You've got to figure out the details of an equitable amount. Do different countries pay different amounts? Are there subsidizes for the poor? Are other greenhouse gases, like nitrous oxide, also included, and at what rate? If someone doesn't pay, how is the tax enforced? All those are part of a grand vision. Just like the grand top down view wherein "nationalists and communists" decided to ban most CFC emissions. And the "nationalists and communists" who decided to ban commercial whaling, outside of a few nations. How would the superior capitalistic system have solved those problems? It's not like the capitalistic system is doing that great a job of preserving commercial fishing. The "Tragedy of the Commons" was based on a fairy-tale interpretation of history. The far greater tragedy occurred due to the commons owners enclosing the land and breaking commoner's rights of use. A.k.a. "capitalism".
    - nroets 4y ago
      Read my post carefully. I'm not saying capitalism will solve the problem. There are many reasonable answers and proposals to these questions. Here's one: https://citizensclimatelobby.org/carbon-pricing-studies/ https://citizensclimatelobby.org/carbon-pricing-studies/ The EU has already placed a price on some emissions: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_Emissions_Trading_System https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_Emissions_Tra... Wikipedia says "In economics and in an ecological context, the tragedy of the commons is a situation in which individual users, who have open access to a resource unhampered by shared social structures or formal rules that govern access and use,[1][2] act independently according to their own self-interest and, contrary to the common good of all users, cause depletion of the resource through their uncoordinated action in case there are too many users related to the available resources". That is not a fairy tale.
      - eesmith 4y ago
        That doesn't change the fact that carbon pricing depends on a grand top-down view of the economy - something you seemed to reject. Read more of that Wikipedia article, including "heavily criticized, particularly by anthropologists and historians": > Critical scholars note that although taken as a hypothetical example by Lloyd, the historical demise of the commons of Britain and Europe resulted not from misuse of long-held rights of usage by the commoners, but from the commons' owners enclosing and appropriating the land, abrogating the commoners' rights. as well as the criticism section at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons#Criticism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons#Critici... with: > Radical environmentalist Derrick Jensen claims the tragedy of the commons is used as propaganda for private ownership.[189][190] He says it has been used by the political right wing to hasten the final enclosure of the "common resources" of third world and indigenous people worldwide, as a part of the Washington Consensus and > Tragedy of the commons has served as a pretext for powerful private companies and/or governments to introduce regulatory agents or outsourcing on less powerful entities or governments, for the exploitation of their natural resources.
dvko 4y ago
Easy - because it’s a luxury endeavor.
- melling 4y ago
  Once again… It accomplishes next to nothing. And we certainly don’t want people driving 1000 miles instead of flying If the electricity comes from coal or nuclear, no one would know the difference, except for the cleaner air
  - dvko 4y ago
    You asked why people talk about flying. This is a problem that can’t be solved at just a single angle. > And we certainly don’t want people driving 1000 miles instead of flying Not necessarily true. A single person in a gasoline car, yes, flying is probably slightly less dirty. More than one person in the car? Driving wins.
    - dzhiurgis 4y ago
      Does driving wins because you are orders of magnitude more likely to die while driving?