6 ms·
It is beyond me how this snail pace of changing the economy to be more sustainable can be interpreted as break neck speed. What was break neck speed was maybe t
by ictebres 4y ago
It is beyond me how this snail pace of changing the economy to be more sustainable can be interpreted as break neck speed. What was break neck speed was maybe the corona response, which was a good thing and could be happening on climate front more…
- xfitm3 4y agoI couldn't disagree more. The response to corona decimated the economy and many businesses. The first priority for life on this planet is to have a decent quality of life. Not being able to afford food or other essentials is hardly a noble objective.
- iudqnolq 4y ago> The first priority for life on this planet is to have a decent quality of life. Yes. Unfortunately, you can't have a decent quality of life without a quality environment to live in.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- MrBuddyCasino 4y agoWhat if the downsides of decarbonisation outweigh the supposed benefits? Is this even possible in your list of possible outcomes? We have some experience of central state power steering large parts of the economy for The Greater Good.
- orwin 4y agoVery true! The New Deal eased the tensions and permitted a pretty fast recovery, while building most infrastructure modern US depends on, hopefully it will have the same effect.
- ako 4y agoThere’s also a lot of proof of the downsides of not controlling companies: pollution, greed, child labor, unsustainable low wages, etc. Companies don’t care about the population, they’re just there to make money. If we don’t set boundaries the world will be a very ugly place.
- MrBuddyCasino 4y agoI'm 14 and this is profound.
- ako 4y agoImpressed that you signed up for hn at 3 years old.
- waboremo 4y agoWhy does the economy take precedent over life itself?
- p0pcult 4y agoBecause the gigawealthy have captured politics more completely than probably any other time witnessed by those of us currently alive.
- themitigating 4y agoHow is that a reason? I think you're using some form of the argument "Why should I recycle this can if X person has a private jet" The answer is because they are both wrong but you only have control over one.
- soupbowl 4y agoWell we are all going to die from climate change anyways. Some extra corona deaths and working economy seem like a win/win If you are a climate doomer.
- xfitm3 4y agoBecause to survive in life you have to contribute to the survival of others. Anything else is selfish.
- ako 4y agoYou can’t have quality of life if you have no life at all.
- paganel 4y agoHonest question: Where does this apocalyptic attitude come from? Do people believe that they’re going to actually die because of global warming?
- p0pcult 4y agoHonest question: do you not?
- paganel 4y agoNo, not really.
- it_citizen 4y agoI had a good life. I am worried about my children and also trying to think about the billions of people that will see their quality of life significantly degraded. Geopolitical instability due to scarcer resources is certainly going to have a massive negative impact on everyone's life. Just look at how a "small war" in Ukraine is already having real life consequences all around the world. Now, imagine the effects of food and water insecurity across the world. Even Russia was not stupid enough to fully block supplies of wheat leaving Ukraine. And this is only one aspect of how climate change might impact you.
- irrational 4y agoAt my age? Probably not. My kids? Probably.
- V__ 4y agoPeople are already dying because of climate change, what are you talking about?
- 4y ago
- it_citizen 4y agoLook at any recent studies about the projected cost of climate change in the decades to come or read a bit about the geopolitical consequences of what 2 degrees means. The consequences of the response to Corona will seem like a nice a problem to have in comparison. And contrary to a bad economic cycle, once the CO2 is in the atmosphere, there is no fixing it at a meaningful scale.
- swader999 4y agoThe future costs seem pretty small and based on useless models. The costs of curtailing natural gas right now will be evident in real death toll this winter though.
- adgjlsfhk1 4y agoThe future costs start with roughly 1 billion refugees from regions that become either underwater, too hot to live, or too little water to live.
- swader999 4y agoUnderwater when sea level rises less than a foot a century? Get serious. Cold kills way more than heat. Death from extreme weather has been largely mitigated by industrialization and modern technology. Increased food production from more CO2 has helped reduce starvation. Please, show me one genuine climate refugee right now.
- abdullahkhalids 4y agoHere is a nice visualization from the UN from 2021 https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/065d18218b654c798ae9f360a626d903 https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/065d18218b654c798ae9f36... > Over the past decade, weather-related events triggered an average of 21.5 million new displacements each year
- swader999 4y ago
- p0pcult 4y ago>The first priority for life on this planet is to have life Fixed that for you.
- DoneWithAllThat 4y agoClimate doomerism rots the brain.
- AYBABTME 4y agoTo be fair, there's limited shipbuilding capacity in the world, with a few dozen very large shipyards capable of producing a few dozens ships a year. And they're busy as is. Also given the shear scale of those yards, it's not like you can just build new ones on demand. Those things are huge, they span the size of a medium city, and require an entire economy of skilled people around them. So even if we were to replace all of the world's fleet to be more energy efficient (which would almost by definition mean larger/longer ships, since they benefit from hydrodynamic efficiencies), it would take a lonnng time to replace the world's cargo fleet.
- LeifCarrotson 4y ago> if we were to replace all of the world's fleet to be more energy efficient (which would almost by definition mean larger/longer ships, since they benefit from hydrodynamic efficiencies) The hydrodynamic efficiencies are a small part of the problem, there are many other things that can be done. You don't need to scrap a perfectly good hull, you can simply choose to run slower, burn higher-quality fuels, or strap on an oxidation catalyst (DOC) to cut CO, particulate filter (DPF) to reduce particulate emissions, or add selective catalytic reduction (SCR) to reduce NOx emissions. But until regulation and the market catch up, old ships will choose to run too fast, to burn whatever's cheapest, and to vent their exhaust directly into the atmosphere.
- AYBABTME 4y agoYou're entirely right, I just wanted to provide rough perspective on the complexity of actually overhauling the world's fleet.
- LargoLasskhyfv 4y agoHrrm. Do you know why I am aware of https://www.cma-cgm.com/news/2749/world-premiere-launching-of-the-world-s-largest-lng-powered-containership-and-future-cma-cgm-group-flagship https://www.cma-cgm.com/news/2749/world-premiere-launching-o... and https://www.cma-cgm.com/news/3379/world-premiere-bunkering-of-a-new-generation-lng-powered-container-ships-begins-in-rotterdam https://www.cma-cgm.com/news/3379/world-premiere-bunkering-o... and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CMA_CGM_Jacques_Saad%C3%A9 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CMA_CGM_Jacques_Saad%C3%A9 and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Saad%C3%A9-class_container_ship https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Saad%C3%A9-class_conta... ? Because I've been curious after I've seen them coming into or leaving port while walking along the river. Like: "Huh? LNG Powered? What does that even mean? Where would they store it?" Several times. Business as usual now, it seems. As is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slow_steaming https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slow_steaming
- legitster 4y agoI mean, if we wanted to decarbonize at break neck speeds - nuclear power and geoengineering are right there. Instead we are working with a very narrow band of acceptable solutions.
- Schroedingersat 4y agoGen III+ or earlier nuclear is a way of slowly solving 10% of the problem. It's not fast and it's limited by an irreplaceable critical mineral the overuse of which would delay full deployment of Gen IV in many scenarios. It's not yet clear that Gen IV is faster or less limited by other critical minerals. Dedicating your shipyards to building offshore wind cranes gets more carbon off the plate sooner than adapting it to build reactor vessels even if you only use the crane for a few years. Building more heavy casting is slow. Every other step of the supply chain is even slower and more prone to overruns than the glacial pace of reactor construction. Geoengineering is the last ditch emergency button. Once we hit it we can't unhit it and it might break other things.
- paganel 4y agoNot sure the governments’ response to Covid should be an example for “this is how things should be done”. After all there are so many bank accounts that a liberal premier can block.
- solarkraft 4y agoThe german covid response was fast for an inert and badly prepared government apparatus. I was still impressed and they were just about in time, but what had to happen was still known well in advance. Everything that had to happen was known way before the virus was a thing, the button just had to be pressed.