(Replying to PARENT post)
Well, suppose all the people who want to be green go ahead and cut back to one car, go vegetarian, live in a smaller house, etc. etc. Maybe if everyone is really dedicated, we could all cut our emissions in half. So then what? We're still all emitting way more CO2 than the planet can absorb; climate change would still happen, it'd just be happening a bit more slowly.
We're not going to realistically solve this problem by all making personal sacrifices, because even in the best case, where everyone chips in, it's only enough to slow the bleeding. If we really want to truly solve this mess, we need to promote truly sustainable technologies that scale well and appeal to everyone.
Don't put solar panels on your house out of a personal sense of guilt about your own emissions, put them on your house because it grows the market for solar, stimulates research into better panels, and helps push forward the economies of scale that are needed to make renewables cost competitive with fossil fuels. Don't buy an electric car because you want to pollute less, buy an electric car because you want to fund the continued technological improvements of electric cars in general.
We're all focusing way too much on merely slowing down the death of the planet when we should be focusing on fixing the problem altogether. Don't aim for a slower death, aim for a faster transition to carbon-neutral. If we all feel that the planet is doomed anyway, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because it's a lot harder to motivate ourselves to try and fix a problem that feels unfixable.
(Replying to PARENT post)
Given the evidence of all of recorded history and archaeological evidence, how is the denial of economics any better than climate change denial? We have many, many examples of environmental changes combined with misaligned incentives bringing about the end of many civilizations.
(Just one example, for which new media exists: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkMP328eU5Q )
As another HN commenter on this post noted, you can't overturn people's incentives through moralizing about some abstract fear. Even when pursuing an obvious course of justice, Gandhi knew that you must align with people's day to day incentives. It does no one good to rail against the stupidity of the masses and the greed of corporations. We need to figure out how to align everyone's incentives.
(Replying to PARENT post)
We see time and time again that laws are required to achieve massive rapid change and reduce the economic impact of that change.
In 1974 one could have spent thousands on a custom installed catalytic converter. That "green" person would have experienced a great financial burden and see no measurable impact on air quality. It would have been a foolish decision. That's why we need laws and that is why the handful of climate change deniers, that have a disproportionate influence on policy, are so dangerous.
How one votes is what matters (mattered) most.
(Replying to PARENT post)
All things being equal, a smaller car (sedan) should get better MPG than a larger car (SUV) [1].
And yet it seems that people's efforts to reduce their environmental footprint is focused on recycling a plastic cup here and there [2].
A very general trend over the past few decades shows us that the price of gas / gallon has increased. So Americans' response to this is: I need to buy a bigger car? A pollution tax would certainly help but is far too big of a thing to accomplish in the short-term.
I've been contemplating a sort of "big car" tax for a number of reasons, and increased gasoline consumption / environmental impact is a key item on that list. (Non-environmental items include (1) the danger they pose to other drivers in smaller vehicles, and (2) the race-to-the-bottom condition no. 1 imposes, since more and more people will want larger vehicles when they feel threatened by the presence of large vehicles on the road, leading to a positive reinforcement cycle)
[0] http://www.driveprime.com/blog-suv-and-crossover-sales-outpa... [1] http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/Find.do?action=sbs&id=37918&i... [2] https://youtu.be/eNx9tvCrvv8?t=1m10s
(Replying to PARENT post)
"Just how energy inefficient the food system is can be seen in the crazy case of the Swedish tomato ketchup. Researchers at the Swedish Institute for Food and Biotechnology analysed the production of tomato ketchup. The study considered the production of inputs to agriculture, tomato cultivation and conversion to tomato paste (in Italy), the processing and packaging of the paste and other ingredients into tomato ketchup in Sweden and the retail and storage of the final product. All this involved more than 52 transport and process stages.
The aseptic bags used to package the tomato paste were produced in the Netherlands and transported to Italy to be filled, placed in steel barrels, and then moved to Sweden. The five layered, red bottles were either produced in the UK or Sweden with materials form Japan, Italy, Belgium, the USA and Denmark. The polypropylene (PP) screw-cap of the bottle and plug, made from low density polyethylene (LDPE), was produced in Denmark and transported to Sweden. Additionally, LDPE shrink-film and corrugated cardboard were used to distribute the final product. Labels, glue and ink were not included in the analysis."
Source: http://www.321energy.com/editorials/church/church040205.html
How does an individual affect change when something as basic as a bottle of ketchup is clearly part of the world that'd built itself with disregard for its impact on the planet?
ZeroHedge Post: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-06-24/why-next-recession-...
(Replying to PARENT post)
This is the root of the problem: the actions of most individuals don't matter no matter what they are. Let's say I switch entirely to renewable energy, stop eating meat, buy local food, and do every other thing possible to reduce my footprint. Great, now I've added, what, an extra half a second to the time we have before catastrophe? It just doesn't matter.
Everyone working together is what makes a difference, of course, but that's hard. It's not just a matter of convincing everyone to act individually.
(Replying to PARENT post)
It's the overwhelming number of people who want to say
they're green, but still own two cars, never take public
transport, eat meat daily, live in big houses, and buy
buy buy.
(Replying to PARENT post)
But what about the rest of the production chain that assumes you're the same as everyone else (whom continues to use and depend on that production chain), which is an ocean of waste compared to what any single person can do? We can individually push the needle very slightly, but it does nothing to push the needle on our behalf within the bigger economic machine. All those wasteful international processes are pushing forward faster than ever. It's like we're bleeding out and you just recommended dabbing the wound with a string of thread.
What are some realistic things that an individual or group of individuals can do to prepare?
(Replying to PARENT post)
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1) Coat the entire arctic with a more reflective compound, so it will not be as likely to melt under the same summer temperatures... the expense of this would be far less than the fallout later. This may interfere with some life in the arctic that depends on surface ice somehow. But considering the rest of the planet will have to adapt in the alternative scenario, I'd say this life would have to adapt. I doubt it has much effect on the rest of the world.
2) Do one of those sci-fi thingies where a compound is discovered which instantly causes a chain reaction to crystallize e.g. water at much higher temperatures than the current melting point. Salt can lower the melting point of water. Isn't there anything that can raise it? But obviously we wouldn't have enough of that compound to just inject into the ice. I've seen spontaneous crystallization of water into ice at room temperature when you hit a bottle. Maybe something like this can be done on a more permanent basis.
3) Release reflective material into the atmosphere (like in nuclear winter) to counteract the greenhouse gas effect and hope this doesn't somehow cause deadly pollution in some other way. After all, the Earth can only radiate energy into space, convection with the vacuum of space doesn't really transfer heat away much at all. But we can reflect the sun's radiation to the Earth, and limit the heating up that way.
4) Instead of reflective material, you can fly satellites into space where they cast a shadow on the Earth (assuming the sun is far enough, I haven't done the calculations, it might be possible that small satellites or gas clouds can cast a shadow on the Earth just like the moon's umbra will in August 19th this year). And in that case we can try to reflect a lot of the energy that way. Of course, they would have to be SUPER reflective and have a high surface area, or they'd heat up within a decade rendering them useless.
(Replying to PARENT post)
https://cdn.static-economist.com/sites/default/files/images/...
The main reason is the growth of Chinese economy. So if you want to make real impact, help the next emerging economies to grow without incurring huge growth in emissions. For example, if you look at the per-capital carbon emission by country:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_di...
China's is half of that of US, while India's is 1/8. Imagine if the India's number grow 4 times to that of China's, any saving in the U.S. will be completely cancelled out and some. In fact, U.S. can cut its emission to 0, and India only needs to grow its number to 75% of that of China's to cancel out the U.S. improvement.
(Replying to PARENT post)
(Replying to PARENT post)
(Replying to PARENT post)
This type of alarmism does not help anyone. The "authorities" have been saying "single digit years" for decades, not "just now". The average person has seen very little change causing more denialism to spread.
Please stop.
(Replying to PARENT post)
(Replying to PARENT post)
Obvious choices would be Tesla (any large automaker with a serious electric program), or a political organization with sane and pragmatic environmental goals.
(Replying to PARENT post)
The car and the "buy, buy, buy" are the only real problems. Cut those two out and the big houses and meat aren't a big deal (or are at least workeable).
Probably the biggest thing you could do to help the environment is not buy any kind of mobile device and to run your computer into the ground.
(Replying to PARENT post)
Of the many people who I know who are seriously concerned re climate change, I'd say 2 have taken truly meaningful steps .
It's not the handful of climate change deniers that's the problem. It's the overwhelming number of people who want to say they're green, but still own two cars, never take public transport, eat meat daily, live in big houses, and buy buy buy.
If you think climate change is a serious issue. If you're concerned that scientists are now talking about the low single-digit years we have to change. If you have kids. Why the *@#! aren't you taking drastic change?