[XogGyux]

@XogGyux

Again, what exactly can individuals do?

If you think nuclear is the magic bullet, then note that it is politicians who already have control over very advanced nuclear tech, simply by being in control of military forces.

What cannot you do? Ironically, short of building your own nuclear plant, you can do just about anything else. You can reduce your consumption, you can shift your consumption towards more friendly sourced items, you can put wind turbines, solar panels in your house if you have a house.
It would be silly to believe that all 7 billion of us will switch all at once immediately, the world wouldnt be able to sustain that even if we wanted it and were willing to do so. So what is stoping you, or I from being part of the very few leading the pack? Ourselves! That is the main barrier.
Again, don't get me wrong, that is just the starter.. but realistically, what can you expect from washington... when both of us want this to happen, both of us can already do a great deal, and neither of us are actually fully doing it.

[Pants-of-dog]

What cannot you do?

End fossil fuel subsidies.
Ban private car use in city centres.
Reappropriate nuclear submarines for domestic use.
Nationalise fossil fuel corporations.
Diversify government investment portfolios away from fossil fuels.
Build rail networks.
Build hydro-electric projects.
Fund green energy projects in the developing world.
Need I go on?

Ironically, short of building your own nuclear plant, you can do just about anything else. You can reduce your consumption, you can shift your consumption towards more friendly sourced items, you can put wind turbines, solar panels in your house if you have a house.

So, people who rent cannot do most of this, nor can those who live in places where the only energy is fossil fuels, or those who cannot afford adding solar or wind.

[XogGyux]

End fossil fuel subsidies.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/ ... rences.png
We already subsidize clean(er) energies over fossil. Part of the reason for the subsidies, all of them, is because it is strategically important. We are energy independent and that is important... see what is going on with russia and europe.

Ban private car use in city centres.

That is nonsense.
A quick search for top largest public city transports:
New York City, New York.
Boston, Massachusetts.
San Francisco, California.
Los Angeles, California.
Washington, D.C.
Chicago, Illinois.
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Miami, Florida.

I am not familiar with Boston or California. But I have seen NY, Chicago, Washington, Philadelphia and Miami. Of those, the only two that make cut it is NY and Chicago. For sure you are fucked in Miami... for one... it is hot as hell, so even walking a couple blocks will ensure you are covered in sweat. And that is large cities. What do you think you going to accomplish by limiting a few thousand cars from a few cities? Those people will still need transport, granted a metro system might be more economical, but it is not as if you can disappear the cost. Yes, I have been saying that any little bit helps, and thats true, but there are far more things that we need to do first. A better, and perhaps more doable thing to do would be have people work from home. Less energy spent transporting people every day, less time for those people stuck in traffic, etc.

Nationalise fossil fuel corporations.

This is you pushing a political agenda that has nothing to do with green transition. A state own fossil fuel corporation will emmit as much CO2 as a privately owned one. Gasoline does not suddently decide how many CO2 molecules will be produced during combustion based on who owns the company that produced the gasoline.

Diversify government investment portfolios away from fossil fuels.

Absolutely yes. It is already happening, not fast enough but it is happening at least in the developed world.

Build rail networks.

No issues with that. Funny enough, one of my first posts in this forum, about 10+ years ago was in favor of rail networks. But it is not just rain networks, we need the grid to be mostly renewables for this to make a strong enough impact. If you burning fuels, you might save some because rail transport per person is more efficient, but it will take decades to recuperate the sunken cost (in terms of CO2) that went into producing the vast ammounts of steel for rails and the humongous infrastructure needed.

Build hydro-electric projects.

The easy ones are already done. But this is problematic, these projects destroy the wildlife when done. We will have to have a water revolution also. There are already several states that routinely experience droughts every year. Perhaps there is something to be said about creating additional water reservoirs and having systems that minimize water evaporation and then use excess solar/wind energy during the days to pump back water into the reservoirs for storage. The problem with this is obvious, while long term it might reduce CO2 emissions, the impact on nature is just as disruptive if not more. It would be counter productive if by doing such a project you end up jeopardizing natural habits and destroy forrests (that capture CO2), wild life, fisheries, economy that rely on water flows, etc. I rather have nuclear than risk all of that.

Fund green energy projects in the developing world.

This is idealistic but not realistic. As it stands, the most aggressive (and certainly overly optimistic) goals are for 2050. Even developed rich countries are likely going to struggle with this transition. Despite their claims, I don't think they will be ready in 30 years as they propose. The good thing is that I don't think this is that important, the top CO2 emitters are large, powerful economies. Who cares how much CO2 guatemala is producing, they are but a drop in the bucket. Your big ticket items are China, the US, Japan, Russia, India, etc. In fact, the top 4 CO2 emitters produce about 60% of the globe... It is counterproductive to start by targetting tiny fish when you have large whales to hit. This, like the nationalization of industry, to me tells me you are more interested in the politics than the actual CO2 effect.

Need I go on?

Sure

So, people who rent cannot do most of this, nor can those who live in places where the only energy is fossil fuels, or those who cannot afford adding solar or wind.

Oh wow, I didn't realize about that. We are doomed, people are powerless to modify their consumption habits as if to have less of an impact on our environment uness the government orders us to do so...

[wat0n]

End fossil fuel subsidies.
Ban private car use in city centres.
Reappropriate nuclear submarines for domestic use.
Nationalise fossil fuel corporations.
Diversify government investment portfolios away from fossil fuels.
Build rail networks.
Build hydro-electric projects.
Fund green energy projects in the developing world.
Need I go on?

And yet, there are things many individuals can do that render some of these redundant. From just not living in that big ass house in the suburbs but moving to an apartment in the city, as to make cars redundant, to working from home whenever possible.

Doing those two things would have a large effect on emissions. And it's already begun.

[Steve_American]

Since neither party had a platform that addressed this, one could assume it was not even part of the debate during the last elections.

While that is true. It misses the point that the voters can vote in primaries to get more Progressives into leadership positions in the parties.

I think that most people miss the power that ads have. Remember the "Big Lie" theory of the Nazis. If you repeat it enough the masses will believe it. The Repuds now have the problem of peer pressure that makes it very hard for individuals to change their minds and loose fellow Repud friends.

.

[Unthinking Majority]

The real hindrance seems to be politicians. The science is settled, while the politicians seem to have also settled on business as usual, so the subsidies for oil and gas continue while alternative energy is still not being supported to the same extent.

For many politicians their re-elections chances via donations from fossil fuel companies is more important than the earth.

I'm perfectly willing to take a small hit on my standard of living to slow climate change until a point within the next 50-100 years when AI is smart enough to figure out to create tech that will be able to remove all the GHG out of the atmosphere we need and design green tech and batteries to store it.

Nature is also pretty amazing. Plant leaves are literally solar panels and wood is a battery. For most of human history humans lived on the energy from the sun stored in plants/animals that were alive now or recently like all other organisms do. But we want more, so we dug up energy from the sun stored over millions of years, and created our own sun (nuclear fission + fusion). With AI, we will become Gods.

The sun is our God basically. It gives everything life. Maybe we shouldn't be messing with it, or be more careful about it.

[Rich]

With Communism you really can have your cake an eat it. There's no need to compromise. You can crush freedom, keep living standards low, exterminate millions and create horrendous pollution.

[Potemkin]

until a point within the next 50-100 years when AI is smart enough to figure out to create tech that will be able to remove all the GHG out of the atmosphere we need and design green tech and batteries to store it kill us all.

Fixed it for you, @Unthinking Majority.

[late]

California is another example of this. Today... the only path out of a carbon-releasing hell is to embrace nuclear


So moving the needle 1% or 2% is not as insignificant as you are portraying it to be.

And again... yes, we need policy changes to address this... but like any major social reform... you need to start small and it will grow with time.

I don't think it will be any different with this.

And don't think for a moment there is not going to be any trade-off.

Nukes will have to be part of the mix.

Get a dictionary.

That was true 20-30 years ago.

"The U.S. has sustained 338 weather and climate disasters since 1980 where overall damages/costs reached or exceeded $1 billion (including CPI adjustment to 2022). The total cost of these 338 events exceeds $2.295 trillion." (That's not only different, those costs keep going up)
https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/billions/

There is always a trade off. But there is a sh*t ton of crap we can do now, which includes doing the R&D needed to build a low carbon future without massive tradeoffs.

[Pants-of-dog]

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8a/2016_Energy-Related_Tax_Preferences.png
We already subsidize clean(er) energies over fossil. Part of the reason for the subsidies, all of them, is because it is strategically important. We are energy independent and that is important... see what is going on with russia and europe.

Europe could easily have avoided this problem by subsidizing only renewable energy decades ago.

That is nonsense.
A quick search for top largest public city transports:
New York City, New York.
Boston, Massachusetts.
San Francisco, California.
Los Angeles, California.
Washington, D.C.
Chicago, Illinois.
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Miami, Florida.

I am not familiar with Boston or California. But I have seen NY, Chicago, Washington, Philadelphia and Miami. Of those, the only two that make cut it is NY and Chicago. For sure you are fucked in Miami... for one... it is hot as hell, so even walking a couple blocks will ensure you are covered in sweat. And that is large cities. What do you think you going to accomplish by limiting a few thousand cars from a few cities? Those people will still need transport, granted a metro system might be more economical, but it is not as if you can disappear the cost. Yes, I have been saying that any little bit helps, and thats true, but there are far more things that we need to do first. A better, and perhaps more doable thing to do would be have people work from home. Less energy spent transporting people every day, less time for those people stuck in traffic, etc.

Many cities already do this.

This is you pushing a political agenda that has nothing to do with green transition. A state own fossil fuel corporation will emmit as much CO2 as a privately owned one. Gasoline does not suddently decide how many CO2 molecules will be produced during combustion based on who owns the company that produced the gasoline.

It would get rid of the profit incentives amd make it easier to end these companies and their fossil fuel extraction entirely.

Absolutely yes. It is already happening, not fast enough but it is happening at least in the developed world.

No issues with that. Funny enough, one of my first posts in this forum, about 10+ years ago was in favor of rail networks. But it is not just rain networks, we need the grid to be mostly renewables for this to make a strong enough impact. If you burning fuels, you might save some because rail transport per person is more efficient, but it will take decades to recuperate the sunken cost (in terms of CO2) that went into producing the vast ammounts of steel for rails and the humongous infrastructure needed.

The easy ones are already done. But this is problematic, these projects destroy the wildlife when done. We will have to have a water revolution also. There are already several states that routinely experience droughts every year. Perhaps there is something to be said about creating additional water reservoirs and having systems that minimize water evaporation and then use excess solar/wind energy during the days to pump back water into the reservoirs for storage. The problem with this is obvious, while long term it might reduce CO2 emissions, the impact on nature is just as disruptive if not more. It would be counter productive if by doing such a project you end up jeopardizing natural habits and destroy forrests (that capture CO2), wild life, fisheries, economy that rely on water flows, etc. I rather have nuclear than risk all of that.

From the science I have read, hydro-electric requires less energy investment per unit of energy created when measured over the entire life cycle of the project, when compared to nuclear.

This is idealistic but not realistic. As it stands, the most aggressive (and certainly overly optimistic) goals are for 2050. Even developed rich countries are likely going to struggle with this transition. Despite their claims, I don't think they will be ready in 30 years as they propose. The good thing is that I don't think this is that important, the top CO2 emitters are large, powerful economies. Who cares how much CO2 guatemala is producing, they are but a drop in the bucket. Your big ticket items are China, the US, Japan, Russia, India, etc. In fact, the top 4 CO2 emitters produce about 60% of the globe... It is counterproductive to start by targetting tiny fish when you have large whales to hit. This, like the nationalization of industry, to me tells me you are more interested in the politics than the actual CO2 effect.

We can do both.

Imagine if we had helped China develop green tech thirty years ago. They would not be the main emitter now.

Sure

Oh wow, I didn't realize about that. We are doomed, people are powerless to modify their consumption habits as if to have less of an impact on our environment uness the government orders us to do so...

Strawman.

Anyway, you do not seem to disagree that people who are not homeowners cannot choose to do any of the individual actions associated with significant home renovation.

--------------

@wat0n

Those of us who do not have cars and already live in urban centres are already doing that and more.

[wat0n]

@wat0n

Those of us who do not have cars and already live in urban centres are already doing that and more.

Indeed, we do. I'm on the same page.

But as you are surely aware there are millions who aren't. And that is definitely a lifestyle choice, especially in wealthy suburbs but in general.

I think that's what @XogGyux is saying, and he's right.

[Pants-of-dog]

Indeed, we do. I'm on the same page.

But as you are surely aware there are millions who aren't. And that is definitely a lifestyle choice, especially in wealthy suburbs but in general.

I think that's what @XogGyux is saying, and he's right.

The fact that individuals can so some less significant changes does not, in any way, change the fact that politicians are doing almost nothing.

I keep asking @XogGyux to provide an example of something individuals can do that compares to political action and all the two of you have provided is a limited set of options restricted to those with a bit of money.

[wat0n]

The fact that individuals can so some less significant changes does not, in any way, change the fact that politicians are doing almost nothing.

I keep asking @XogGyux to provide an example of something individuals can do that compares to political action and all the two of you have provided is a limited set of options restricted to those with a bit of money.

Those with "a bit of money" represent the majority of the middle and upper classes. Anything politicians do will effectively change their lifestyles so they'll pollute less.

They could just change it themselves, but they don't because they don't want to.

[Pants-of-dog]

Those with "a bit of money" represent the majority of the middle and upper classes. Anything politicians do will effectively change their lifestyles so they'll pollute less.

They could just change it themselves, but they don't because they don't want to.

Your proposals exclude most of the world.

Even if, for example, every single private car user in the USA immediately stopped using their car, this would only reduce GHG emissions due to local transportation, and only by about a third. So, this measure would reduce overall emissions for the USA by about 9%.

Note that @XogGyux has provided a long list of places where people would not choose to do this because of lack of public transport and other reasons. So realistically, you would be lucky to get an emissions reduction of three percent like this.

Meanwhile, nationalisimg Exxon and its resources and using that to switch all its current customers off fossil fuels would significantly reduce emissions for the entire world and might even keep us from three degree rise.

[wat0n]

Your proposals exclude most of the world.

Even if, for example, every single private car user in the USA immediately stopped using their car, this would only reduce GHG emissions due to local transportation, and only by about a third. So, this measure would reduce overall emissions for the USA by about 9%.

Note that @XogGyux has provided a long list of places where people would not choose to do this because of lack of public transport and other reasons. So realistically, you would be lucky to get an emissions reduction of three percent like this.

Meanwhile, nationalisimg Exxon and its resources and using that to switch all its current customers off fossil fuels would significantly reduce emissions for the entire world and might even keep us from three degree rise.

9% is not insignificant at all.

I don't see how would nationalizing Exxon do any of that. There is zero evidence of nationalized oil companies being less pollutant than private ones.

[Pants-of-dog]

9% is not insignificant at all.

Then it is too bad that your proposal will not get that much,

I don't see how would nationalizing Exxon do any of that. There is zero evidence of nationalized oil companies being less pollutant than private ones.

Again, as I explained before, the resources would be used to transition its entire customer base away from fossil fuels.

[late]

9% is not insignificant at all.

True, but it would take a miracle to get 1/10th that much.

I've been watching people that can't think make dumbass excuses for a generation.

[wat0n]

Then it is too bad that your proposal will not get that much,

Even half of it would be significant and perhaps attainable.

Again, as I explained before, the resources would be used to transition its entire customer base away from fossil fuels.

How so?

[Pants-of-dog]

Even half of it would be significant and perhaps attainable.

You think it is perfectly reasonable and realistic to expect half of the US population to stop using a car in the next few months.

How so?

What do you mean?

[wat0n]

You think it is perfectly reasonable and realistic to expect half of the US population to stop using a car in the next few months.

Next few years. BTW, if that figure is from before the pandemic we're already halfway done.

What do you mean?

How will nationalizing Exxon accomplish that?