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Until people are willing to use less energy or consume fewer goods and services (that cost energy to produce), it's going to be difficult to achieve. You can b
by chpatrick 3y ago
Until people are willing to use less energy or consume fewer goods and services (that cost energy to produce), it's going to be difficult to achieve.
You can blame the big evil corporations but they're polluting so we can buy our crap from them.
- DarkNova6 3y agoThe average US consumer causes 15t emissions of CO2 per year. The average EU consumer causes 7.5t emissions of CO2 per year. This is a structural difference, not one of consumers. They want you to blame the individual so the big actors can keep pocketing big money.
- chpatrick 3y agoWhy isn't it reasonable to blame the individual when the individual EU consumer manages to cause half the pollution of the individual US consumer?
- truculent 3y agoDo you think the EU consumers are trying harder than the US ones?
- chpatrick 3y agoYes, absolutely.
- staunton 3y agoMost people in either region are not making any significant effort. They just live their lives like everyone else around them. The difference is in what that looks like. Anyway, what's with this dichotomy "corporations should change behavior" vs. "consumers should change behavior"? Those two interact and influence each other. Obviously, both must change their behavior. This is a process that must be bootstrapped.
- chpatrick 3y agoThat's definitely true and top-down regulation is important so the whole economy has to clean up its act and it's not a competitive disadvantage for any one company to do it. However, I don't like this frequently repeated claim that "it's actually big companies that are polluting!". They're polluting on our behalf, that's not an excuse.
- omeid2 3y agoIt is more along the lines of "I can't do much personally against big companies". In the same way that you can't just "personally" create a better public transport system instead of driving.
- chpatrick 3y agoYou can absolutely personally not buy so much shit from big companies. You can also vote for more public transport, which most americans don't.
- DarkNova6 3y agoAnd big oil & friends are massively lobbying to keep it just the way it is. It's easy to buy a senator, in same cases 10k are all you need to get his support. Edit: Since the maximum nesting was reached. I will leave it at saying that "A party system is twice as good as a one party system".
- chpatrick 3y agoYou still need people to vote for them, and then the responsibility is on the individual voter.
- quickthrower2 3y agoNo of course not. It is surprisingly different though. Is it all the nukes and renewables?
- fsloth 3y agoOne of the structural reasons is that US produces most of it's own energy (aka hydrocarbons) and has enough left to export, while afaik EU imports 50% of the energy it needs.
- DarkNova6 3y agoI am form the EU and I don't "manage" anything. It just happens that on average, Europe has more efficient infrastructure, more strict regulation on pollution and is massively supporting green energy. Don't be fooled to believe that your personal life-choices will make the difference. In most countries 50% of all emissions are determined by the electricity you are consuming with transportation coming in second. The US used to be a railroad country. But that was bad for big oil, cars and aircraft so it was dismantled.
- chpatrick 3y agoWhen it comes to being forced to drive in the US, sure, but everything in the US from cars to buildings to meals is massively oversized compared to Europe. That's a personal choice. Many americans also proudly vote against environmental legislation or public transport infrastructure. That's also a personal choice. Blaming big oil for that is just an excuse.
- DarkNova6 3y agoOversized by how much? 100%? That alone cannot explain why the US pollutes twice as much. And as I have said, most of pollution comes from energy production. You are missing the mark.
- chpatrick 3y agoIf the consumers consume twice as much then energy production will pollute twice as much, that's exactly my point.
- DarkNova6 3y agoLogically, this is correct. However, your point is irrelevant as you have insufficient data to prove it. Stating that the average US citizen consumes twice as much is quite a daring that needs to be proven.
- mcv 3y ago
- christophilus 3y agoI think it’s more complicated than that. It’s pretty easy to live in most western European cities without a car. It’s almost impossible to live well in most American cities without several cars per family. America has been engineers around environmentally unfriendly habits. Today’s consumer has little to do with the massive foundation on which their society rests. Edit: my family has only one car, but it’s because I hate driving / commuting and have worked remotely for 10 years. If I had to drive to work, we’d have two cars.
- chpatrick 3y agoToday's consumer can choose to not buy a huge pickup truck or eat beef three meals a day, or not vote against the new bike lane.
- christophilus 3y agoYeah. I do all those things. I'm vegan and I have a single car, and I support local walking and biking trails. But even so, I bet I'm not as green as the average European because I still have to drive far more than they do.
- chpatrick 3y agoThat's great to hear but there's a country full of people who don't do that.
- pnut 3y agoIn addition to US salaries being higher, energy (petrol and gas and electricity, each of them) are significantly more expensive in Europe. Random US person, imagine if your salary was cut in half, auto gas cost $6/gallon, and your monthly utility bill tripled. You'd think hard about your consumption. https://www.statista.com/statistics/263492/electricity-prices-in-selected-countries/#:~:text=Global%20household%20electricity%20prices%202022%2C%20by%20select%20country&text=At%20the%20time%2C%20Danish%20households,paid%20almost%20three%20times%20less https://www.statista.com/statistics/263492/electricity-price....
- DarkNova6 3y agoOnly recently energy prices had a hike. But the EU has always been well below the levels of pollution of the US: https://www.statista.com/statistics/986460/co2-emissions-per-cap-eu/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/986460/co2-emissions-per...
- bheadmaster 3y agoPeople need to feed their family, and in order to do that, they need transportation. Until public transportation is good enough not to make you miserable, people will use cars. Blaming people for consuming is like blaming the victim of domestic abuse from not running away and becoming homeless.
- chpatrick 3y agoCars are only a part of the problem, but people who need to drive any old car just to work are an even smaller one. There are many many people who drive oversized fuel inefficient cars for no particular reason, or are just as wasteful in the rest of their lives. Even in Europe many people drive alone in their cars even when great public transport is available just because it's more comfortable. That's not the gas station's or the car manufacturer's fault, it's the driver's.
- lotsofpulp 3y agoCars are basically the entire problem. Cars allow everyone to consume more space per person, and more space per person means more mass can be consumed and that mass has to travel further distances. And all of that translates to more energy consumed per person.
- chpatrick 3y agoWhen it comes to the overall problem of climate change cars are only one issue, the others being manufacturing, construction, services, agriculture, travel, etc. Many of these don't have a clean solution yet for the current demand so fossil fuels are here to stay unless we manage to reduce that demand, which the individual consumer needs to accept.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- lotsofpulp 3y ago>unless we manage to reduce that demand, which the individual consumer needs to accept. My point was no one needs to accept that as long as cars are around.
- fsloth 3y agoBlaming individuals is useless. Governments are the parties who generally are responsible for fixing structural problems. The market is composed of companies that operate within boundaries set by the government. Individuals are more or less forced to live their lives by the market environment where they live. The solution is in governments and corporations. The only reason why one would want to fix the problem via individual consumers is in fact if one: a) does not want to fix the problem b) wants to direct blame from the more guilty party (energy companies) to the consumer OFC this is not that black or white. Currently there are NO OPTIONS to fossil fuels to keep planetary civilization running.
- staunton 3y ago> to keep planetary civilization running Did you mean: "to never decrease consumption in rich countries"?
- fsloth 3y agoNo. Without hydrocarbons there is no food to start with. We are way, way, way behind a point where the humanity could decide to stop using any hydrocarbons cold turkey and not mass starve in the billions. Then comes rest of the industry (on which food production depends). I hope the reality was different. That is not to say rich world consumption is not a pathological facet of the equation. But it's far from being the only consideration.
- staunton 3y agoThere's a huge gap between "cold turkey into starving" and current goals (which are still not enough and also mostly won't be achieved). A transition away from fossil fuels that was just constrained by ensuring no mass starvation would look very different. This is not at all what the discussion is about. Meanwhile, mass starvation will be on the agenda at 3°C of warming...
- bamboozled 3y agoHow do we hold a government accountable in any reasonable time frame, mass scale protests ? Election cycles are too slow now.
- zirgs 3y agoIf I choose not to fly then the plane will still depart without me. Many airlines flew completely empty planes during the pandemic.
- vel0city 3y agoSure, if just one person decides to not fly it will still fly. But what if 10% of consumers? 30% of consumers? 80% of consumers? If nobody is standing at that gate does the plane still fly? Sure, regulation quirks mean a few will, but would they keep flying that empty plane forever? If half the people buying bottled water stopped this year, would the bottled water industry keep production the same, increase it, or decrease it?
- zirgs 3y agoI can deprive myself from the experience of seeing far away countries, but billionaires won't deprive themselves from their yachts and private jets. And no - trains are not a solution. I can't travel to the American continent with a train. Should travelling be available only to rich people again?
- vel0city 3y agoAnd thus, we continue to spiral into the same thing most people are harking on in this thread. Should single family homes with large yards be available to only rich people? And unless the government starts shooting private planes out of the sky, even government regulations aren't going to stop rich people from flying. I'm not saying you should never fly. I don't know your life. I agree there's a lot of good economic outcomes from having an aviation industry and overall it brings the world closer together, which is probably good. But I do think global tourism probably isn't the best thing in the world climate-wise. I'm just trying to push back against the idea that end consumers have zero say about what corporations do climate-wise. Those planes are flying because people want to sit in those seats (generally, outside of those flights during covid to keep routes). Bottled water makers make bottled water because people buy it. Car companies keep making bigger cars because most Americans keep wanting bigger cars. There's a feedback loop, and ignoring it or flat out denying it isn't going to help solve these challenges. I'm not saying never board another plane in your life. I know I am, eventually. I'm just suggesting, maybe swap some trip involving a flight for a more local vacation every now and then. If we all reduced the demand for the flights a bit, fewer planes would fly. I'm not saying never buy another bottled beverage. I'm just saying, maybe the tap water isn't that bad, and its not too difficult to just fill a cup instead of grabbing a single use bottle every time.