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This data is good for cognitive behavioral therapy and not much else. In that, the world is certainly not going to end, and maybe it's helpful to look at some

This data is good for cognitive behavioral therapy and not much else. In that, the world is certainly not going to end, and maybe it's helpful to look at some data that trends positive in order to inspire hope. But we are committed now to living in a world that will be radically different and less pleasant for a lot of people. How fast these trends improve will determine the scope and magnitude of degraded pleasentness. Regardless of any change, more extreme weather events more frequently will become more normal. The socioeconomic impacts that are likely to be the most jarring in the global north will probably surface from migration pressure as people from the global south are displaced due to heat and sea level rise. It is optimistic to think that we'll be on track for 2 degrees of warming, let alone 1.5. At this point, the quiet part just starting to be said out loud is that we'll never hit 1.5. We'll probably never achieve any semblance of the paris agreement goals. And even as we approach 2 degrees, 2050 looks hotter and more extreme than anything humans have ever experienced in the past. Probably one of the only short term options between now and 2100 will be solar radiation management -- a largely untested tech that is surely a terrible outcome. I'm just summarizing the latest IPCC synthesis report [1]. Adding a bit of editorialization in perceived outcomes. One of the most conservative organizations on earth, their assessment is bleak: systems are already permanently damaged, and they're likely to become more so in the near-to-distant future. My goal is not to make anyone reading despondent. I just think these kind of short snipes of perceived positive trends bury the reality of the situation that we are living through. If the goal is to assure us that the world's not going to end, it's quite a low bar to set. And there's quite a gradient of suffering between. [1] https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/syr/ https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/syr/

marcosdumay 2y ago
> But we are committed now to living in a world that will be radically different and less pleasant for a lot of people. Committed? We will have extra energy for carbon capture on the next decade. This is a problem we can solve. Not before it gets worse, but we can stop it from being permanent.
- forgetfreeman 2y ago
  Great, now we need viable large scale carbon capture technology and enough loose funds to bribe an industry into existence globally. That 2nd part is the real trick.
- geysersam 2y ago
  Stop living in a fantasy. Direct air carbon capture can never be more efficient than just not burning fossile fuels in the first place.
  - Brigand 2y ago
    Having excess energy from solar could make it possible to capture the excess co2 over time.
  - FeepingCreature 2y ago
    Sure it can. Why wouldn't it? Say you find a source of energy with zero cost. Now direct air carbon capture is free. "But you don't have a source with zero cost." Great, now we're talking numbers, how cheap does it have to be? So long as energy transport has inevitable losses, carbon capture stands a chance. In other words, IMO we should consider fossil fuel offsetting with carbon capture as a highly lossy energy transport technology that can reach any fossil fuel consumer on earth.
    - HPsquared 2y ago
      Even with free energy, you'd need to invest a lot of capital and then dispose of the CO2 somewhere.
    - geysersam 2y ago
      Energy is not the only cost. There are also massive material costs building the carbon capture infrastructure. A reasonable estimate for the scale required is the existing fossile fuel infrastructure. That is, direct air carbon capture means investing an amount on the order of the value of the existing fossile fuel infrastructure to spend energy to achieve nothing of value (except offsetting the damage we caused by not switching to renewables earlier). It's a complete nonstarter. Only a vehicle used by the fossile industry to delay the transition.
paulmd 2y ago
In the vein of “this is what people considered ‘comically fat’ as the punchline of a joke when the Simpsons started running”, it’s funny to look back at the “Toby ruins everything” video and look at what Aaron Sorkin considered “comically devastating” for climate change in 2012 in The Newsroom. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Uc1vrO6iL0U&t=228 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Uc1vrO6iL0U&t=228
FeepingCreature 2y ago
> Probably one of the only short term options between now and 2100 will be solar radiation management -- a largely untested tech that is surely a terrible outcome. Maybe it's time to put a billion or two into testing all these untested techs then.
- HPsquared 2y ago
  That's what I find so baffling. Why aren't we putting serious resources into geoengineering, adaptation and mitigation? It's so underfunded in comparison to what we're spending in a futile attempt at emission reduction.
  - unglaublich 2y ago
    Because there's no economic incentive. We can only create one with proper policies, but politics have been bootlegged by industry who only looks at short-term gains.
  - klyrs 2y ago
    > Why aren't we putting serious resources into geoengineering, adaptation and mitigation? Are you running for president of the US? What do you think would happen to either candidate if they made this central their platform in today's political environment? Spoiler: rich old people will not suffer, if anything, they'll just stop moving to Florida and Arizona.
DoctorOetker 2y ago
I agree with your comment, not because I don't think there is any hope, but because I see a situation were valid and viable hope is buried in the noise of feel-good-show hope and subsidy-ogling hope. I am not saying it will be easy to build it, or cheap, or without any drawbacks, but... It is physically possible to generate energy by cooling the planet. Its cold in space, its cold up there. To run a heat engine you need 2 temperature baths at different temperatures. Lets take for the higher temperature our surface temperature, and for the lower temperature the temperature at or slightly above the tropopause (say 11 km above surface, somewhere between polar and equatorial regions). At that height temperatures might be say -50 deg C. Now consider the following engineering challenge: a buoyant vessel holds taut ~12 km "atmosphere elevator", made of SCG (single crystal graphene). Along such cables could be suspended chimneys made of light fabric, or perhaps pipes conveying coolant up and down, ... As a thought exercise: suppose the hook floating in the tropopause/bottom of stratosphere is used to heave up and down buckets of water (the same number of buckes going up and down, so apart from friction this transport costs no energy (think of a pulley). as the water travels up it freezes, giving off heat at a higher layer, closer to dark cold space where it would end up anyway eventually, as the ice is lowered it absorbs heat from the lower layers. If the water/ice buckets were insulated, and only brought in thermal contact at the top or bottom of the structure, then it would dump the heat at the top only, above the CO2 and water blanket where it can more easily escape to space, and it would absorb heat only at the bottom. This means we could run a heat engine at the surface generating energy, without proliferation concerns (because when we do it its for energy, but when others do it it must be for weapons, or for gaining experience requisite for weapons)...

marcosdumay 2y ago

> But we are committed now to living in a world that will be radically different and less pleasant for a lot of people. Committed? We will have extra energy for carbon capture on the next decade. This is a problem we can solve. Not before it gets worse, but we can stop it from being permanent.

forgetfreeman 2y ago
Great, now we need viable large scale carbon capture technology and enough loose funds to bribe an industry into existence globally. That 2nd part is the real trick.
geysersam 2y ago
Stop living in a fantasy. Direct air carbon capture can never be more efficient than just not burning fossile fuels in the first place.
- Brigand 2y ago
  Having excess energy from solar could make it possible to capture the excess co2 over time.
- FeepingCreature 2y ago
  Sure it can. Why wouldn't it? Say you find a source of energy with zero cost. Now direct air carbon capture is free. "But you don't have a source with zero cost." Great, now we're talking numbers, how cheap does it have to be? So long as energy transport has inevitable losses, carbon capture stands a chance. In other words, IMO we should consider fossil fuel offsetting with carbon capture as a highly lossy energy transport technology that can reach any fossil fuel consumer on earth.
  - HPsquared 2y ago
    Even with free energy, you'd need to invest a lot of capital and then dispose of the CO2 somewhere.
  - geysersam 2y ago
    Energy is not the only cost. There are also massive material costs building the carbon capture infrastructure. A reasonable estimate for the scale required is the existing fossile fuel infrastructure. That is, direct air carbon capture means investing an amount on the order of the value of the existing fossile fuel infrastructure to spend energy to achieve nothing of value (except offsetting the damage we caused by not switching to renewables earlier). It's a complete nonstarter. Only a vehicle used by the fossile industry to delay the transition.

paulmd 2y ago

In the vein of “this is what people considered ‘comically fat’ as the punchline of a joke when the Simpsons started running”, it’s funny to look back at the “Toby ruins everything” video and look at what Aaron Sorkin considered “comically devastating” for climate change in 2012 in The Newsroom. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Uc1vrO6iL0U&t=228 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Uc1vrO6iL0U&t=228

FeepingCreature 2y ago

> Probably one of the only short term options between now and 2100 will be solar radiation management -- a largely untested tech that is surely a terrible outcome. Maybe it's time to put a billion or two into testing all these untested techs then.

HPsquared 2y ago
That's what I find so baffling. Why aren't we putting serious resources into geoengineering, adaptation and mitigation? It's so underfunded in comparison to what we're spending in a futile attempt at emission reduction.
- unglaublich 2y ago
  Because there's no economic incentive. We can only create one with proper policies, but politics have been bootlegged by industry who only looks at short-term gains.
- klyrs 2y ago
  > Why aren't we putting serious resources into geoengineering, adaptation and mitigation? Are you running for president of the US? What do you think would happen to either candidate if they made this central their platform in today's political environment? Spoiler: rich old people will not suffer, if anything, they'll just stop moving to Florida and Arizona.

DoctorOetker 2y ago

I agree with your comment, not because I don't think there is any hope, but because I see a situation were valid and viable hope is buried in the noise of feel-good-show hope and subsidy-ogling hope. I am not saying it will be easy to build it, or cheap, or without any drawbacks, but... It is physically possible to generate energy by cooling the planet. Its cold in space, its cold up there. To run a heat engine you need 2 temperature baths at different temperatures. Lets take for the higher temperature our surface temperature, and for the lower temperature the temperature at or slightly above the tropopause (say 11 km above surface, somewhere between polar and equatorial regions). At that height temperatures might be say -50 deg C. Now consider the following engineering challenge: a buoyant vessel holds taut ~12 km "atmosphere elevator", made of SCG (single crystal graphene). Along such cables could be suspended chimneys made of light fabric, or perhaps pipes conveying coolant up and down, ... As a thought exercise: suppose the hook floating in the tropopause/bottom of stratosphere is used to heave up and down buckets of water (the same number of buckes going up and down, so apart from friction this transport costs no energy (think of a pulley). as the water travels up it freezes, giving off heat at a higher layer, closer to dark cold space where it would end up anyway eventually, as the ice is lowered it absorbs heat from the lower layers. If the water/ice buckets were insulated, and only brought in thermal contact at the top or bottom of the structure, then it would dump the heat at the top only, above the CO2 and water blanket where it can more easily escape to space, and it would absorb heat only at the bottom. This means we could run a heat engine at the surface generating energy, without proliferation concerns (because when we do it its for energy, but when others do it it must be for weapons, or for gaining experience requisite for weapons)...