The main action advocated by the author here is to increase efficiency (in insulation, appliances, food production, transportation) as a means to curb CO2 emissions and slow climate change - all very important. Lately I've been reading Saul Griffith's book "Electrify" which proposes a different tack - "simply" electrify all energy usage and let people maintain their current lifestyles exactly. Interestingly, doing so would <i>reduce</i> total US energy consumption[0] to about half its current levels while still allowing big trucks and air conditioning and fun energy-intensive things. A lot of that energy reduction comes from a) the higher intrinsic efficiencies of electrical machines and generation compared to heat engines and b) no longer needing energy to run fossil fuel exploration, extraction, and refining processes.<p>Griffith is also careful to note that climate solutions are "yes ands", so we should increase efficiencies as much as we can in addition to electrifying as much as we can (and also pursuing ambitious strategies like fusion and CCS). Definitely make a great case of rolling out existing solutions like solar and wind in a big way to bring down carbon emissions really quickly.<p>[0] - the book focuses only on the US, but results could be similar in countries with similar economies.
I cannot upvote this enough. We have a strict <i>budget</i> left for carbon emissions. It's not an exam in the future that we are currently studying for to pass. But thinking in budget terms also means talking about budgeting/rationing but I guess it needs to become really bad before we even dare to touch that...
Yes there are a lot of ways to reduced emissions. We should also do now the ones that are already available right now (like home insulation).<p>On the same line though decommissioning nuclear plants in Europe was always a bad move.
Italy abandoned nuclear with a referendum 1987 just after Chernobyll and again voted against nuclear in 2011.
Italy then buys nuclear energy from France and gas from Russia. This is just putting the head in sand and moving the problems out of sight.
Germany is/was about to make the same mistake.
Nuclear is a far from perfect solution available now which is beeing replaced for the hope of a much better solution much later on. We are not sure we'll get the much better solutions down the line. We should make all the green(ish) bets we can.
> Of the hundreds of strategy plans I’ve analysed over the five years I’ve been studying energy, almost every single one ensures three things. First, that global citizens will still buy a lot of energy. Second, that control of energy resources will remain concentrated among a few industry players. Third, that energy-intensive companies and their shareholders will still make huge profits.<p>And there it is: the big boys are addicted to oil profits and "the spice must flow". Last time I looked (a few years ago) the ten most profitable companies in the world were nine oil companies and Apple.<p>(As I type this there's a guy outside driving a gas-powered noisy golf-cart thing with a tank and a gas-powered pump spraying plant poison on the lawn. It's a microcosm of what's wrong with us. Poisoning the air, land, and water, polluting sound itself, to maintain a wasteland of useless grass! What's more, you could make a lawn that maintained itself and fed some livestock, and not waste this guy on this stupid destructive job.)<p>Anyhow... Here's a link to an old "brain dump" comment of mine in re: systems of agriculture. <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24827329" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24827329</a><p>There's also a great case to be made for integrated alcohol fuel production on a local ecologically harmonious scale to power ICE vehicles (or hybrids) In many cases it makes way more sense that going directly for full electrification of cars, trucks, and busses, etc. (I know of <a href="http://alcoholcanbeagas.com/node/277" rel="nofollow">http://alcoholcanbeagas.com/node/277</a> but there are others.)<p>As pointed out in TFA we have all the solutions and technology we really need already. What seems to be missing is the knowledge and will to employ them.
One avenue which doesn't require a lot of people/companies to participate, is carbon capture. Not only can it reduce the net emission, but it can even reverse the trend. One example is SpaceX which has plans to produce some of its methane fuel for starship by carbon capture using solar.
I think there is a contradiction: on one hand, consumption should be reduced for sustainable production. But I have not heard anything on reducing the work time. I do not think that there can be a consensus that asks to work more for less.
It is not possible for some type of workers, who already work 12 h/day and have no savings.<p>Something should change in what work is, how production is organized and profit is produced or I do not see how else this contradiction can be resolved.<p>The work can be organized by reducing work time (workday) to produce all there is necessary for biological living. Say 4 h workday (see productivity growth on why this is possible), no wage cut, at production factors, construction, food, etc. This 4 hour workday will be enough for some good level of living. And everything else can be produced somehow else, not as work. Then it will not be necessary to keep production of some object only for the sake of paying for a house, thus consumption will slightly lower but work day will lower, too.
For a very long time now the basic premise has been to go to the largest connected market that exist and buy from whoever sell energy at the cheapest price. When nations want to encourage more renewables they add subsidies in hope that this will enable some companies to deliver a product onto the market that has a lower sticker price. In some cases they offer to pay the subsidies as a bonus on top of the market price, thus enabling companies to lower the sticker price below that of competitors.<p>This system works great if you want to optimize for price. Even if a nation want to sell cheap in order to fund an invasion force, the buyer can continue as before and just buy based on the price. Similar for carbon emissions, as the buyer doesn't feel responsible for the subsidies. If there is an offer on the connected market then the buyer can buy it.
Whatever people say, the solution is less buying power for everyone. For now, that's the only solution. It's hard to hear, but any economic crisis is beneficial for the environment.<p>There is no way we can make enough changes in 10 years, so things must go the other way. Jean Marc Jancovici says emissions must be shrink 5% per day. You can't have a thriving economy anymore.<p>Of course nobody wants to make any effort, because it means selling your car, turning off heating/AC, forgetting that vacation, forgetting that steak, even quitting your job, etc etc.<p>On one hand, we think people who live in the forest, far from everything, are crazy people. But the reality is that a life of sobriety, economic degrowth, austerity, those are the things that are needed to *save the world*.<p>We need to accept to eat pasta, rice and vitamins for a long time unless civilization moves away entirely from fossil fuels so that it can properly adapt.<p>If you refuse to accept that you must reduce your living standard, you are part of the problem, plain and simple. Politicians and companies will do exactly NOTHING if it angers consumers or if consumers keep giving those companies money.<p>I'm often quite pessimistic about the ability of politicians to change course about co2 emissions. Consumers have too much powers.
Bill McKibben has an idea for fighting climate change and Putin at the same time. Basically, he has a plan to get Europe decarbonized enough by next winter that it doesn't need Russian gas or oil.<p>Article -- This is how we defeat Putin and other petrostate autocrats
<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/feb/25/this-is-how-we-defeat-putin-and-other-petrostate-autocrats" rel="nofollow">https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/feb/25/this-i...</a><p>Video Interview -- <a href="https://youtu.be/rJ9XfdbCddk" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/rJ9XfdbCddk</a> Bill McKibben: How To Defeat Putin and Climate Change | Amanpour and Company
I'm hoping we get some new green movement soon that is much more pragmatic about how we can actually reduce reliance on hydrocarbons. Nuclear, and more natural gas are the answer, at least transitionally.<p>Oh, and also I'd like to see green movements taking less Russian money...<p>"People think Europe depends on Russia for energy because it lacks its own, but 15 years ago Europe exported more natural gas than Russia does today. Now, Russia exports 3x more gas than Europe produces. Why? Because climate activists, partly funded by Russia, blocked fracking." <a href="https://twitter.com/ShellenbergerMD/status/1499386637066727424" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/ShellenbergerMD/status/14993866370667274...</a><p>"In 2014, NATO's secretary general revealed Russia was funding climate activists, saying, “Russia... engaged actively with so-called nongovernmental organizations working against shale gas to maintain dependence on imported Russian gas"
<a href="https://twitter.com/ShellenbergerMD/status/1499387277721550849" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/ShellenbergerMD/status/14993872777215508...</a>
I am all in to be a good custodian of the world.<p>But I am tired of the insipid, agitated state, screaming and pushing fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD).<p>When I was a young man, I was told the world will freeze, and within five years we will all die. (Good times for fur trade!)<p>Then, the ozone layer will be gone, and within five years we will all die. (SPF 5000 anyone?)<p>Suddenly in the early '80s it flipped to the world is warming, and within five years we will all die.<p>More recently, it just 'climate change' because the FUD has been so rapidly changed, and within five years we will all die.<p>No one is denying that the climate changes. What people are tired of and denying is the FUD.<p>Every single generation thinks all previous generations where idiots; but we, WE know it much better and are smarter then all!<p>Wait till next generation, and see what they tell about us.<p>(Edit: Reference to an article with news clippings of the above <a href="https://cei.org/blog/wrong-again-50-years-of-failed-eco-pocalyptic-predictions/" rel="nofollow">https://cei.org/blog/wrong-again-50-years-of-failed-eco-poca...</a> )
edit2: let the down voting begin!