The dismaying reality is that it is driven by the wealthy. I got rid of my car, I shop local, and everything in the home is low emissions. No reduction in my personal life can ever offset the way they live.
The truth of the matter is that it's impossible to stop climate change in the short and mid term without degrowth in energy consumption. World leaders gathered and celebrated when they agreed to trade responsibilities for CO2 emissions, when a market-oriented world economy was always going to provoke this result unless there were explicit limits to the production of contaminant energy sources.
Driven by the wealthy and enabled by the stupid.
If this topic ceased to be a partisan issue, we might actually see real change and limits enforced.
A world where pollution producers would need to price cleanup and management into their production (which would in turn incentivize cleaner alternatives).
Where corporations might be held liable for damages from their climate or eco negligence.
But as long as this remains an issue that the masses are going to be divided over, the world is going to burn as stupid people insist 3rd degree burns on asphalt is just part of the circle of life.
But I drive my car less, that should do it! /s
This is the reason we're should focus out efforts to make a ruckus and force decision makers to enforce carbon neutrality BY NEXT YEAR instead of by next century. Of course that won't happen but that would be the reasonable way.
It's not driven by the wealthy, because there are far fewer wealthy people than everyone else.
Individual shopping habits are a band-aid until we can fully replace how some of those habits work.
Carbon taxes would be infinitely preferable to voluntary changes, but we can't pass carbon taxes because people will go absolutely insane if asked to pay the true cost of their goods.
No duh, because not a single country has made any real attempt to lower their citizens' emissions.
It will take sacrifice from all of us to stop warming.
Forget 1.5°C, honestly, forget 2°C as well, keeping it under 3°C is likely the best that we can hope for right now. You're needing to throw out our gas-based car infrastructure, reduce our reliance on jets as much as possible, lower not just meat consumption but also almonds/alfalfa/etc., and that is just to get started.
Really, I don't see the average voter letting that happen. What's going to happen is eventually, sometime 30-40 years from now, a heat wave is gonna thrash the Middle East, consistent 130°F days for a solid month, 100,000 people dead, and the very next year planes will be in the air, making clouds to block the sun.
We are not ready to give up the things that the developed world will have to give up to truly back away from this coming apocalypse.
The majority of emissions come from just a handful of large companies, even if every individual cut their carbon footprint to zero those companies would still continue to kill the planet. It's also easier to change the behaviour of some companies than every person on the planet.
I mean, over the years I've heavily reduced my meat intake, am super conscientious about transportation (haven't flown in a decade, keep my revs low when I drive, and try to get all my errands done in efficient ways as to minimize gas usage), turn off lights, ration my hot water usage, don't eat out at wasteful restaurants, buy "ugly" produce from the grocery store, promote renewable energy solutions whenever possible, compost, recycle, and create extremely little garbage. Yet, at my work, several of our AC generators that we use to power the facility use more oil in one day than my car does in its entire lifetime. Several handfuls of billionaires and their families emit the same amount of carbon as the poorest 66% of humanity. Seems to me, if we want to solve climate change, we have to get rid of the biggest polluters first, then transition to clean energy.
And the biggest polluters are corporations/industry, and the rich.
I wonder if I'll be alive for the moment everyone goes from "This is bullshit and I'm going to ignore it" to "Oh no who could have seen this coming?"
Some people will never admit anything is happening. They'll just blame everything on something else.
We are already seeing the effects of climate change. If they were going to admit it, they would have done so already.
The fact is that this was a conscious choice, even recently. The switch to natural gas that everyone is touting is one that is designed to cause higher short-term emissions.
Methane is really bad over a 20-year time frame and only really lets natural gas equal coal over a 100-year period (assuming typical fugitive emissions rates). The transition from coal to natural gas is accelerating the rate at which we boil ourselves alive.
Methane is burned at the point of use and produces carbon dioxide. Ideally there is no methane released in to the environment.
Methane leaks
Something like 3-10% of all methane production leaks. Methane is about 80x worse than CO2 over a 20-year period.
Being vegan is the most impactful change that individuals can make.
But we won’t change.
It is totally hopeless.
Systemic problems require systemic solutions. Hoping everyone collectively changes their behaviour isn't a solution unfortunately.
We have all the tools and technology to make a huge dent in this problem right now if not outright solve it. The most impactful thing you can do is spread awareness and do what you can to make this a voting issue if you live in a democracy. It could even be as simple is making it a non negotiable for how you choose to vote.
Lack of climate action needs to be a death sentence for the careers of the political class or it will become a death sentence for the the rest of us.
I'll do you one better: don't have kids!
Maybe Vote for candidates who won't FORCE people, and children, to have babies.
Not having children is the most impactful individual change one can make, well over going vegan.
And the easiest. But even if all animal products were eliminated worldwide tomorrow, it would probably still not be enough for the emissions target. So individual changes do not make a dent in the problem.
regrettably, God made animals taste good.
This will disproportionately effect the poor and developing countries, so the thinking of elites and super rich is that there's still plenty of time to rectify the situation.
Rectify it? No, they know they'll be gone before their life is disrupted so much that money can't fix it.
Yes but they're paying for an already protected forest to be protected, so it balances out right?
Fortunately the EU is making that kinda advertisement illegal
It's China generating all the pollution. Their 'reported' emissions are 13.7 billion metric tons versus the US's 5.9 billion. And 90% of China's fuel consumers are private, one-off shuttles that don't even report their emissions. US is contributing a tiny fraction of global emissions and it's falling. Yes, US industrialized earlier and has contributed more in total, but we can't time travel, we have to look at who is emitting NOW. China's emissions are rising and nobody there cares to put a cap on it. You want to stop the world from cooking? Talk to China.
Edit: it’s odd how many tankies are on lemmy. Obviously we should take steps ourselves to stop emissions too but China is the world’s true problem when it comes to emissions. US has been steadily falling while China is rising rapidly and that’s only what’s actually reported
I’m not a big fan of China, but that’s just dishonest. Yes, China emits more than twice the co2 US emits. But that means that its per capita emissions are still way below those of the US, even after western countries outsourced a lot of their own pollution to China. Yes, you NEED to talk to China if you’re going to solve it, but pretending that it is more on them than on the west is ridiculous.
What do you think China is producing that's creating all that pollution? I'll give you a hint. IT'S EVERYTHING WESTERNERS ARE BUYING.
didn't we pass the point of no return like 10 years ago
Eh, humanity had a good run I guess
And my cousins are having kids. 🤦
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