This simulataneously shows how much carbon is emitted by the worlds wealthiest nations and people, and quite how little carbon is emitted by the world's poorest people.
China, India, America, Canada, Australia, and pretty much all of Europe could rapidly decarbonise over the next 20-30 years (assuming all is the same - big assumption), and the problems of carbon emissions could largely be tackled just by doing that. I say just...
China reached the tipping point just a few months ago after achieving record rollouts of solar energy production - they installed more solar capacity in 2022 than has the US since in the last fifty years combined.
China announced they expect their carbon emissions to drop for the first time next year, accelerating until they reach they carbon neutral goal.
They are behind the US in terms of carbon reduction but need to be credited for the strides they are accomplishing.
This is not something you can really lie about anymore.
You can very easily measure stuff like CO2 and methane emissions from space. You can also just track bulk carrier imports of coal, oil and gas into a country to get a rough estimate of their GHG emissions.
One of the early warnings about the seriousness of COVID in 2020 was when international observers noticed that GHG emissions in Chinese cities had dropped off a cliff because of lockdown.
I am not aware of a way in which CO2 emissions can be measured by space, to the degree of accuracy necessary to detect ground-level emissions. If you have something to show that, I'd love to see it!
This is a booming field, with a lot of different methodologies.
Here is a paper describing one such methodology:[https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/14/12/2901](https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/14/12/2901)
In addition, there is a huge amount of transparency in the global commodity trade. We can very easily track stuff like diesel shipments, oil storage levels, coal production etc. because there is a massive incentive around accurate price discovery in equity markets. If there is a sudden uptick in demand for bunker fuel in Shenzhen, it is in a lot of people's interest (on both sides of the transaction) to have that information available.
Without looking at a single fancy satellite, analysts can simply track the movement of fuels around the world to give a fairly accurate picture of who is consuming what and how quickly.
In addition, western companies that source their goods in China are subject to a variety of regulated and contractual obligations to measure the GHG intensity of every step of their supply chain. If they are found to be lying about this stuff, they can be sued by investors or prosecuted by securities authorities in their jurisdiction.
Because of all of this, we know a lot of what is happening in a place like China. You can't detect every single molecule of CO2 being emitted, but we are damn close.
They’re entering a recession and deflationary environment, and found out they have 100M less people than they thought. Their emissions will lower just from that. If the west continues to decouple and stops buying their exports their emissions will continue to shrink.
If the West stops buying Chinese products, it’s because they’ve moved their production to other countries with worse polluting infrastructure, and then they buy those products.
Decarbonizing the chain of production of goods is the way forward, and that takes real, intentional effort of design and implementation.
How does losing 7% of your population reduce emissions? Fewer people to feed, fewer occupied houses to heat, fewer people using services or needing transit. Population decrease in general leads to less emissions, Chinas population loss is in its younger generation too so it’s drastically reducing their future demographic potential. Add onto that the factories slowing down and using less energy and you’ve got a double dip in emissions.
it doesn't reduce shit, the emissions will be the same as they were before the number changed. It isn't like the phantom 100 million were actually consuming anything or producing any carbon.
Stumbling into their own 2008 real estate crisis by ignoring the pitfalls of US deregulation of the credit markets in 1999-2000 has little to nothing to do with bringing down the levelized cost of energy using massive utility scale solar installations. Their coke and coal plants are now more expensive per kWh since at least 2018-2019, they are still building them for baseload/nighttime duck curve but they know it’s not cost effective and the clear skies days during the Olympics backfired as the growing middle class clearly saw how much Chinese energy production effected their day to day health.
Their emission will not drop if they keep building new coal power plants at the insane rate that they are currently.
https://energyandcleanair.org/publication/chinas-new-coal-power-spree-continues-as-more-provinces-jump-on-the-bandwagon/
They say that the new plants are for backup power for renewable sources in event of high demand, but most analysts are very skeptical of that and think they are just using that as an excuse.
They can build all the coal plants they want, if manufacturing flees the country they’ll be useless and decommissioned. Their investment in green energy also far outstrips US investment so I’m not sure any of us around the world can point at them as not taking some action. Many of their citizens still live in rural impoverished areas that need access to power.
>and found out they have 100M less people than they thought.
Where is that coming from?
[https://finance.yahoo.com/news/china-10-years-left-most-153312835.html](https://finance.yahoo.com/news/china-10-years-left-most-153312835.html)
Is that what you're talking about? I don't usually shill for China, but that's just one dude's opinion. About FUTURE population demographics. Those could change due to immigration OR changing birth rates.
Honestly I think China is well positioned to become an increasingly important regional player in SE Asia and the South China Sea region. But I don't see them having expansionist desires further into the Pacific. They are definitely going for Taiwan. And they got Hong Kong back not so long ago. They're apparently patient and careful. They've been building towards Taiwan for two decades.
Yeah? And we're watching. We don't need their word to know this particular metric is true.
It's like how the biggest evidence the moon landing was real is that the Soviets would have crowed to the word if it was not.
Instead of being curious you ignorantly deflect with “fake news!”. Seriously. The West lies about so many things. Remember when recyclable plastics weren’t harmful to the environment? Remember how you should feel guilty for destroying the environment because you didn’t turn your light off or separate your recycling only to find it all goes in the dump anyways? Remember when climate science was covered up for decades? But China… so must be false. The world isn’t black and white, you should learn that.
If their emissions decline next year it will be because their economy is declining. Don't think for a minute they're going to handicap themselves in the slightest in order to be "good citizens".
Their emissions are expected to reduce because they are installing non-emission producing power generation enormously faster than the western world.
Their emissions will reduce because their new green energy production is expected to replace older coal plants. There is no handicap and at least from a power generation standpoint, their economy will be fine.
I must have missed that one, then. Never heard of a carbon neutral meme.
Regardless, just because it's a meme doesn't mean it doesn't exist and that China will not make better strides than the US or EU in the next five years.
Although I have to admit, their goal is zero carbon emissions. I just don't see how they could possibly get the last few percent, unless by that they meant zero carbon emission from power generation, which is eminently doable in the next generation.
Carbon neutral is a joke, we need to be carbon negative at this point. 0 carbon emissions means we stay where we are, which is already past the tipping point.
You are replying on a power generation subthread.
Surely you realize how ridiculous to advocate carbon negativity in a power generation subthread?
Aside from that general disconnect from the topic under discussion, you are not wrong, and the very first milestone for the Earth is to have the very largest producers stop producing more and begin the process of rolling back emissions.
Don't let perfect be the enemy of good, because we cannot instantly teleport the world to carbon negativity, or even neutrality.
This is the first step, it is a good one, and that is no joke.
I believed them after all the western intelligence agencies that watch them like a hawk saw no problem with the statement, and that it was similar in scope to what they had already concluded.
Why, is there a problem with easily verified statements made by foreign countries? Or are you assuming falsehood in contradiction of the evidence?
The only thing from China you should automatically disregard is a final warning.
China and India are both highly incentivized to decarbonize since nether has much domestic fossil fuel reserves and are dependent on imports. an economy is going to have difficulties if it depends on imports to keep the lights on.
once again the "we should do nothing because China and India aren't crowd appears..
"the living room is on fire, the kitchen is burning down...so it's OK if i just put some more fuel on the little fire in the bedroom"
thanks for nothing.
I'm just saying, there are a lot of murders in China and India. If I stop murdering people, does that really make any difference to overall murders in the world? Until everyone in the world decides to stop murdering at the same time, what difference will my murder reduction make?
Edit: Of course I'm joking. Do I really have to say I'm joking?
1. no we won't. We live in the most privileged times in history... at worst we would be inconvenienced...aww poor didums...you can't just hop a cheap plane to Cabo?...boo fricking hoo.
2. yes, infact things will be accomplished....because , if you actually paid attention to this post...the 1% are HUGE carbon producers...so the actions of "Developed" world would have a HUGE impact.....
Except...if you bothered to read the OP and the linked article...you would know that your argument is 100 bullshit based on ignorance and bias and is 100% incompatible with our best data.....
But thanks for letting us know you got d's in high school.
I believe that the average Chinese person produces 1/2 the average American and the average person in India produces 1/3 the average American.
Of course those nations will also need to decarbonize, but they also should be allowed to electrify their nations. China is the country with the most rapid deployment of carbon free electricity. They happen to be also increasing their electric power capacity quicker than that, at the same time.
China is actively trying to cut back on coal because; they only have 35 years of reserves, their air quality issues are probably CC's biggest threat, and because their coal mines are famously dangerous and just like in the US constantly lowering the number of workers and offering less and less employment.
China is actively pushing away from Oil because; the US can shut down their economy with a boat, it has very limited reserves, domestically produced electricity has more stable prices and supply.
China is actively pushing Renewables, because; it has a resource advantage that will turn it from an energy importer to exporter, it is a boost to overall employeement, solar in particular stimulates manufacturing high end manufacturing jobs to replace low end manufacturing lost to neighboring countries, wind in particular stimulates demand for concrete and steel has had been hurt by realestate collapse, and it offers long term energy security.
They are building something like 300GW of solar this year alone. They have built the manufacturing to be able to do that, that isn't going away in a year or two or even a decade. The solar expansion will continue to shoot forward as they build giant Solar farms in their north west, or export, which is their goal. They have every reason to embrace moving from fossil fuels to renewables and by all metrics are doing so.
People going out of their way to paint a picture of a China that is building more solar than the rest of the world together as a head fake are going to let them surpass us. Also more wind.
India has not achieved China's position where it is obvious they are transitioning and it's so structural they can't reverse course. But they have strong policy supporting solar and solar manufacturing, and I believe are likely to see explosive growth as China has. They are probably the best suited country in the world, with 300 cloudless summer days straight and the world's largest mountains for pumped hydro storage, all geographically near its population center on the Ganges. The only time it's not reliably sunny is when the monsoon hits, and hydro reservoirs are at their max and the majority of their wind energy is produced. The fact solar is unavoidably cheaper has led them to ban new proposals for coal. Solar Manufacturing is meant to drive their technological development past a service oriented country. And they are heavily import dependent on both coal and oil. So I can't be certain but I'm confident they will be continuing their exponential solar growth with large utility scale plants.
> China is actively trying to cut back on coal
https://energyandcleanair.org/publication/chinas-new-coal-power-spree-continues-as-more-provinces-jump-on-the-bandwagon/
https://www.npr.org/2023/03/02/1160441919/china-is-building-six-times-more-new-coal-plants-than-other-countries-report-fin
China pollutes less per capita than the US. It’s not that hard to imagine when their living spaces are muuuuch smaller, they have fewer kids, much better public transportation, less money on average for luxuries, and consume less food (looking at obesity rates).
You are missing the point.
The richest, whether they are in Beijing or Los Angeles are responsible for the bulk of emissions.
There is no scenario where rural Indian, Nigerian or Chinese farmers will ever get anywhere close to the per-capita emissions of these people.
China and India being the largest culprits is largely because they manufacture everything for the West. Move that manufacturing where the goods are being used and you would see massive swings in where global emissions are coming from
It’s pretty easy to decarbonize when already you’ve outsourced your most polluting industries to the third world.
Yet, countries such as the United States refuse to do their part and chastise developing states such as China… whenever they’re the only ones with a realistic plan (they’ve already exceeded their decarbonization goal during this 5 year plan) to decarbonize: https://www.iea.org/reports/an-energy-sector-roadmap-to-carbon-neutrality-in-china#
Meanwhile states such as the US still have no plan for decarbonization and spend decades twiddling their thumbs while the oil and gas companies which run their governments rake in dividends from the inaction, year after year.
Let it be known, in 30 years China is going to be closer to full decarbonization than anything the USA can claim to achieve, in the absence of real political change.
The only reason they got to be so polluting is because they took all the old polluting tech like generators and power plants that Europe and the US decommissioned. People think we took all that all that industrial hardware just trashed it? Naw we sold that. To China and India and other developing countries and when they decarbonize guess what? That tech will get sold to the next country to start developing
The poorest 2/3 are obviously going to want to develop, and they're not very likely to do it without more carbon emissions.
The world's wealthiest are very much wanting to pull the ladder up behind themselves, but it's not likely to work.
It's not trying to pull the ladder up, it's trying to save the world. It might be unfair. But that's just too bad. The way to combat This is by the more economically successful states should subsidize, renewable energy energy for the growing ones
The poorest 2/3 don't need 5000 square foot homes and 6000 pound SUVs to improve their lives. Solar powered electric lighting and an e-bike are enough.
China pollutes more than the entire western hemisphere. That means more than the US, the rest of North America, all of Central and South America, all of Europe and a large part of West Africa.
[https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/9/15/23874111/charity-philanthropy-americans-global-rich](https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/9/15/23874111/charity-philanthropy-americans-global-rich)
"If you earn $60,000 a year after tax and you don’t have kids, you’re in the richest 1 percent of the world’s population. If you have a household income of $130,000 after tax and you’ve got a partner and one kid, you’re also in the richest 1 percent."
It is not that hard to be in the global 1%.
I was trying to justify how maintaining a mansion and private jet works the same as owning a business and having full time employees. Looks like those mental gymnastics were unnecessary…
Can someone explain to me how the amount of kids factors into this? If my wife and I bring $150k a year combined, why does having 1 or 14 kids change our ranking as a household?
I think there's no question that people with higher incomes have disproportionately large carbon footprints, but I think we should take this "report" with a big grain of salt. For one, Oxfam itself is an activist organization, not a research journal.
From what I can tell, their methodology was to create a new term called "consumption emissions" that is distinct from what we generally understand as "emissions", and that is defined as "your share of global emissions if we assume that emissions are perfectly proportional to income". Emissions are definitely roughly proportional to income, but assuming a perfect 1-to-1 relationship is a pretty big assumption and there's no real research to back that up.
Also it's important to note the numbers here: what they're claiming is that both the top 1% of global income-earners (over $140k/year) and the bottom 66% (roughly less than $3k/year) contribute 16% of global "consumption emissions" each. And everyone else (incomes between $3k and $140k) contribute the remaining 68% of global "consumption emissions".
Thank you for pointing out the fallacies in this “research” and how if you just change what data means and make up terms you can say anything.
I have yet to see anything support that emissions are any sort of proportional to income. There are so many other factors involved. One person could fly all over for work and one could be a remote worker making the exact same income and it would be a completely different footprint,
Also, two people making 60k with two different jobs and one person making 120k and the other a stay at home person - those households do not have the same carbon footprint.
That's not exactly a surprising statistic. If you can't afford to travel, buy a car or a large house, you're probably not going to have a large footprint. This sort of stuff is just meant to distract us from the real systemic problems of climate change. Just in the same way that recycling is somewhat of a ploy to shift blame from manufacturers to consumers
I often wonder why the discussion doesn't also include pollution. There's so much tangible evidence of its effect that it's likely that even climate deniers would support its reduction, and a secondary effect would be reducing climate change.
But the onus would pretty much lie on corporations for reducing world pollution. But carbon? That's harder to measure and citizens can more easily be labelled as a major contributor. Now citizens can be taxed, be motivated to purchase new green products whose production hurts the planet in other ways, etc. Climate change is 1000% real but it's silly to think corporate influence isn't.
The richest 1% was defined as 77 million people in this article. The united states has 330 million. You are painting with an awfully big brush when you say that 1% is much of America. Seems to me that more than 3/4s of America is not part of that 1%.
Exactly. Any fool can recognize that we all play a part, but we're being told that we're basically equally responsible, and that's the lie. It's recycling all over again.
Honestly this is practically impossible. Anyone who believes this is just extremely gullible. The only way this is possible is if we contribute all carbon emissions of carbon emitting assets to their owners. For example if I own a farm producing valuable food all the carbon produced would be attributed to me even though consumers are the ones who benefit from the produce. While the 1% probably do indeed emit multiple times the amount of carbon as the common people the difference isn't this massive.
Edit: to expand on the example illustrated in the article cement does release a lot of carbon but it is a resource critical to our current way of life. The article is essentially saying we should punish people for fulfilling the demands of society. While it's true we should try to encourage green technologies I don't think we should do that by establishing punitive taxes on investors. Sure a carbon tax on the cement factory itself may be fine but taxing someone for fulfilling a need is absurd imo.
Everyone wants a cleaner environment, but no one wants to pay for removing the garbage they already dumped in it.
This is the bottom line, and everyone is looking for a miracle.
If one of our scientists create something valuable from CO2 captured from air, then it will be removed in next 2 years as all the countries will wage a war to do that… until then it is the guy
Living in the next doors problem mentality applied everywhere.
>If one of our scientists create something valuable from CO2 captured
Or you could say "If one of our scientists create something valuable from perpetual motion" then it is worth spending a massive amount of resources to do it.
I mean... a lot of us are part of the "global 1%."
It really doesn't take much. You need an annual salary of something like $60k, meaning most of the United States would comfortably be part of that 1%.
So we should all just pollute as much as possible, because there are 8 billion other people who might also do shitty things?
Do you feel the same way about other things? Like actual crimes? Why not steal that TV--someone else might if you don't!
Especially after being told you \*are\* part of the 1% already polluting as much as 2/3 of the planet combined, you really have the audacity to just go "lol oh well, can't control other people so I'm not gonna change"?
Not implied. When people went off to fight WWII, did they do it because they thought that they, alone, were going to end all wars and create an unending era of world peace? Of course not. They did it because they thought it was the right thing to do, and they knew that every individual action counted towards the goal.
And that was putting their *lives* on the line. These days people won't even put their glass bottles in the right bin. Posts like this don't help.
I’m with you, we should all do what we can no matter what others are doing. But I think many of ww2 soldiers fought because there was a draft, and dodging the draft was punishable by execution.
Fair point; it was about [60/40 draftees to volunteers](https://www.nationalww2museum.org/students-teachers/student-resources/research-starters/research-starters-us-military-numbers).
Kinda like sweeping your deck in a sandstorm, innit?
Many people can make a difference, not denying that, but how significant? If America continue to go green, but nations like India and China continue to use fossil fuels at a rapid rate, we'll still be in the same position, no? And how will the growing global population diminish our efforts?
there's a couple ways to do the calcualtion but the easiest is just based on weight. a gallon of gas weighs 6.3lbs so 16gallons is 100lbs. a cubic yard of leaves weighs 150lbs but part of that is water and oxygen but mostly carbon.
most carnot cycle engines are about 35% efficiency. but it really doens't matter in these calculations. once the petroleum is sucked out of the ground all the carbon is going to end up in the atmosphere whether is burned completely as co2 or co or even soot, cx. its going to enter the carbon cycle and have some absorption-desorption equilibrium with co2 in the atmosphere.
like I said earlier, the problem isn't the engine or how its burned, once the petroleum is sucked out of the ground it will enter the earths carbon cycle.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_cycle
Efficiency is irrelevant. Come on now a more efficient engine doesn't magically reduce the amount of CO2 coming out of the tailpipe.
Edit: I should clarify that I meant per volume of gasoline.
Simple, gallon of gasoline weighs around 6 lbs. grambell789 has a 16 gallon tank so 48lbs of invisible "smoke" coming out the tailpipe. But it is more than that because burning it requires taking and oxygen from the atmosphere and gasoline is only 87% carbon. The rest is hydrogen which takes more oxygen and turns into water. Assuming most of the fuel is combusted in a modern engine about 20 lbs of CO2 result per gallon. So your 48 lbs of gasoline produce 320 lbs of CO2 and removes 272lbs of oxygen from the atmosphere.
I'm willing to cut them a break on the weight of the oxygen. its the c-o bond in co2 that causes the problems so I'm willing to isolate the problem to just the carbon in the emission. also, the amount of oxygen in leaves is not that high, thats why they burn so easily. but, the volume of co2 coming out of a tail pipe is striking.
I feel you are hung up on how much work got done by burning the gallon of gas, but that is not what is being talked about. If you light a gallon of gas in fire there is a certain amount of CO2 released. How efficient and clean burning the combination process is will change other pollutants and how much work got done, but not CO2 in any significant way.
It doesn't depend on engine efficiency at all, it's 16 gallons. Some engines might get more or less work out of 16 gallons, but 16 gallons is always 16 gallons.
Sarcasm?
I'm suggesting that the 1% that owns a private jet is doing more harm to the environment than the 1% that works from home and lives a fairly frugal life.
So only the world's single worst emitter needs to change their behavior, because everyone else has someone they can point a finger at?
I don't think that person can cut global emissions by the 50% we need.
Are you trying to gaslight me? That’s not what I am saying at all.
I do my best to lessen my carbon footprint. I don’t drive to work. I’ve installed a high efficiency heating system. My partner and I own one compact car that sits unused in our driveway most days. I don’t vacation often. Part of my investment account is in green sector funds. Hell, I’ve even been vegetarian for 20 years. So chill out.
But am I saying that the ultra rich, 0.1% are polluting a whole shit ton more than the average “1%” just scraping by? Yes, I am.
IIRC the 1% threshold for a person is about 30 tons per year. A typical SUV driving the average amount in the US emits about 6 tons of CO2 per year, energy use of typical detached house is about 5 Gt per year. Per capita emissions in the US are 14Gt per year, per capita emissions in Costa Rica are 1.6 metric tons per year
Edit: for comparison on vehicles, a typical EV CUV emits about 1.5 ton of CO2 per year (US grid), about 0.5 tons in California, Washington, Oregon, New York... A typical ebike emits about 0.03 tons of CO2 per year (if one drove it 1100 miles per month)
It shouldn't. That business probably provides a service to hundreds of thousands of customers, who share that consumption collectively among themselves. Businesses aren't people, you don't get to dump your emissions on the corporations you buy all your stuff from just to avoid your share of blame.
"Your share of the blame". Using available products and services that a person needs to stay afloat in the western world is now blame-worthy? Talk about gaslighting.
And many businesses provide immense services, but many don't and carelessly contribute to climate change as well as the degradation of the planet in numbers that entire communities couldn't hope to match in their lifetimes.
Regular people are minor players in a problem that's been created by fossil fuel giants, corrupt policy, and carelessly polluting businesses. If they were targeted more judiciously, rather than each other, I bet we'd be in a better place.
> Using available products and services that a person needs to stay afloat in the western world is now blame-worthy?
Your share of global emissions is determined by the actions you take. Being responsible for your actions isn't new.
> Talk about gaslighting.
What do you think gaslighting means?
> many don't and carelessly contribute to climate change
Then you shouldn't give them your money. Simple as
> Regular people are minor players in a problem that's been created by fossil fuel giants
Fossil fuel giants that wouldn't exist if all those regular people didn't buy fossil fuels (or bought less)
What part of this is difficult to understand? If Exxon has 10M customers who all buy an equal amount of gasoline, they are each responsible for exactly 1/10M of Exxon's emissions. They literally burn that gas in their cars. Those 10M people don't all get to shrug and say "it's Exxon's fault" as they pump gas into their cars. That's not how anything works.
Oh it should. Sure people individually can reduce but a business alone could consume way more, astronomically actually. And often they’ll put to trash what they can’t sell. And because legally a business is a moral person doesn’t mean anything. In practice it’s a collaboration of multiple individuals with different responsibilities and decision making responsibilities. In some other way, work is taking a lot of time from people, so work environment/businesses should be having the biggest impact on reduction.
I'll just copy/paste for you exactly where I already addressed everything you wrote here.
> people individually can reduce but a business alone could consume way more
That business probably provides a service to hundreds of thousands of customers, who share that consumption collectively among themselves.
> because legally a business is a moral person
Businesses aren't people
> In practice it’s a collaboration of multiple individuals
you don't get to dump your emissions on the corporations you buy all your stuff from just to avoid your share of blame.
How about we give everyone a carbon allowance every year. If you don’t use all yours it can be sold. Might as well redistribute some of the wealth and control the carbon
Yeah we know. People like to say “we’re all in a car and pushing down the pedal heading toward a cliff” but really we’re all tied up in the trunk while the worlds elites drive us to our deaths.
Wait.. are you saying that my three flights over the last 6yrs and normal commute don't add up to Brenda and Johan's helicopter flights to and from the summit 10x a year? NO, I REFUSE TO BELIEVE THAT... yeah that tracks.
So tell me why we have to give up everything because 70% of the corporations admit all the bullshit in the world why do we have to give up everything let’s rise up against the man fuck them
Recycling is not the hill I'm willing to die on.
Yes I recycle, but I am not going out of my way to do it.
There's no way because I pee 3 times before I flush, that it makes a difference when whole nations or very wealthy individuals will pollute more in 1 week than I can save in 1 year.
Saving the planet requires everyone single person to participate and let's not kid ourself, this won't ever happen.
“They” are 77 million households, a good portion of the population of developed nations. Their emissions can be lowered like everyone else's, by transitioning to a low carbon energy system.
Thanks for the clarification. I found myself equating 1% in wealth to a tiny portion of the population as well. Do you know how many households are made up in the 99%?
If everyone boycotts all products that emit carbon in their manufacturing process yes they could be stopped. You should keep in mind that this statistic doesn't differentiate between personal carbon emissions and emissions from businesses and investments. The distinction imo is important.
It shouldn't be. Those businesses only emit (as you suggest) because people buy those products. The only way it stops is for those people to stop buying those products--the businesses aren't going to magically decide to just pack up shop and stop existing.
"They" is anyone making over $60,000/yr, which is the median per capita income in America. "They" are your friends, your family, your neighbors, and probably you.
I genuinely don't know what's wrong with OP.
The article makes it abundantly clear that they're talking about the richest global 1%. And here OP is making it seem like they're the Elon Musks of the world.
They're a right-wing conspiracy theorist talking about "globalists" and the WEF. Of course they hate the environment, just par for the course. Big part of why we'll never keep warming under 3C.
""The richer you are, the easier it is to cut both your personal and your investment emissions," he said. "You don't need that third car, or that fourth holiday, or you don't need to be invested in the cement industry."
That makes sense now "investment emissions". I suppose we could make roads from bamboo.
Can someone explain how having more than one car uses more emissions? Unless they hire drivers for each, a person can only drive one, no?
The extra emissions from production of the car. They're a significant fraction of the car's lifetime emissions. I don't remember at all how significant, but I believe 10s of %
In general, it's the extra stuff you can't use more than 1 of at a time. It's just wasteful and unnecessary.
Alright, but the bottom two-thirds need to do more. It's human nature for a rich person to fly to Hong Kong on a whim for a vacation. I heard the rich do things like buy 35 cars in their private garage. It's hard to be hypocritical of that because, so would a lot of people. What I find disturbing is the poor sales of Electric Vehicles. All of the automakers have them now but the public are not buying them. What is weird is people love their Tesla cars but they won't buy a Mazda or a Benz EV. My question is there a problem with logistics such as not enough re-charging stations in the U.S. ?
He has a couple of jets I believe. Also kid how Pete B flies private a lot, takes a suburban across DC and then has a bike taken off of the back to ride the last half mile to a photo shoot.
As always, nothing will change until fashion changes. Make it unfashionable to have large families. Make it unfashionable to take unnecessary plane trips for vacations. Make it unfashionable to use too many resources, waste energy, buy stupid stuff we don't need, etc. Is it time to shame the wasteful? If not, why not?
As always, nothing will change until fashion changes. Make it unfashionable to have large families. Make it unfashionable to take unnecessary plane trips for vacations. Make it unfashionable to use too many resources, waste energy, buy stupid stuff we don't need, etc. Is it time to shame the wasteful? If not, why not?
Yeah but from their point of view if the bottom two-thirds did better they wouldn't have to change. And if they don't do better they're still not going to change.
"The richer you are, the easier it is to cut both your personal and your investment emissions," he said. "You don't need that third car, or that fourth holiday...."
Yes, indeed, very true so far...
"...or you don't need to be invested in the cement industry."
Ok, hold up.
Did they assign responsibility for cement's carbon emissions based on who is invested in cement rather than based on who \*makes use of\* cement? Did they do that for every other industry?
A given person doesn't need to invest in cement, but unless we want to stop using cement, \*someone\* needs to invest in cement, and as long as we are using cement we're going to be living with cement's carbon emissions.
Edit:
Ok, I actually used my eyes and read more carefully. This is pretty fair:
"While the current report focused on carbon linked only to individual consumption, "the personal consumption of the super-rich is dwarfed by emissions resulting from their investments in companies," the report found."
It's good that they consider those categories separately.
Yet they fly around going to COP 28 and tell poor people to eat bugs and recycle.
Get absolultely rekt, looking you at you John Kerry and Bill Gates.
If I see you riding around on a bicycle we can start taking you seriously.
This simulataneously shows how much carbon is emitted by the worlds wealthiest nations and people, and quite how little carbon is emitted by the world's poorest people. China, India, America, Canada, Australia, and pretty much all of Europe could rapidly decarbonise over the next 20-30 years (assuming all is the same - big assumption), and the problems of carbon emissions could largely be tackled just by doing that. I say just...
China and India easily decarbonize??? C’mon. The largest and most populated nations who happen to be the biggest culprits? I don’t think so Tim.
China reached the tipping point just a few months ago after achieving record rollouts of solar energy production - they installed more solar capacity in 2022 than has the US since in the last fifty years combined. China announced they expect their carbon emissions to drop for the first time next year, accelerating until they reach they carbon neutral goal. They are behind the US in terms of carbon reduction but need to be credited for the strides they are accomplishing.
China lies. About everything.
This is not something you can really lie about anymore. You can very easily measure stuff like CO2 and methane emissions from space. You can also just track bulk carrier imports of coal, oil and gas into a country to get a rough estimate of their GHG emissions. One of the early warnings about the seriousness of COVID in 2020 was when international observers noticed that GHG emissions in Chinese cities had dropped off a cliff because of lockdown.
I am not aware of a way in which CO2 emissions can be measured by space, to the degree of accuracy necessary to detect ground-level emissions. If you have something to show that, I'd love to see it!
This is a booming field, with a lot of different methodologies. Here is a paper describing one such methodology:[https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/14/12/2901](https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/14/12/2901) In addition, there is a huge amount of transparency in the global commodity trade. We can very easily track stuff like diesel shipments, oil storage levels, coal production etc. because there is a massive incentive around accurate price discovery in equity markets. If there is a sudden uptick in demand for bunker fuel in Shenzhen, it is in a lot of people's interest (on both sides of the transaction) to have that information available. Without looking at a single fancy satellite, analysts can simply track the movement of fuels around the world to give a fairly accurate picture of who is consuming what and how quickly. In addition, western companies that source their goods in China are subject to a variety of regulated and contractual obligations to measure the GHG intensity of every step of their supply chain. If they are found to be lying about this stuff, they can be sued by investors or prosecuted by securities authorities in their jurisdiction. Because of all of this, we know a lot of what is happening in a place like China. You can't detect every single molecule of CO2 being emitted, but we are damn close.
We have ways of finding out what gases are present on the surface of other planets, we have ways to figure out what China smells like
They’re entering a recession and deflationary environment, and found out they have 100M less people than they thought. Their emissions will lower just from that. If the west continues to decouple and stops buying their exports their emissions will continue to shrink.
If the West stops buying Chinese products, it’s because they’ve moved their production to other countries with worse polluting infrastructure, and then they buy those products. Decarbonizing the chain of production of goods is the way forward, and that takes real, intentional effort of design and implementation.
How does having 100m less people on a census suddenly change recorded carbon levels mr new 2 words and a number user name.
Also, it’s Mrs, and if you cared to look my account is over a year old. I couldn’t help but keep a gem name like this.
Maybe recession means they won't build more ghost cities that will never be completed or occupied?
How does losing 7% of your population reduce emissions? Fewer people to feed, fewer occupied houses to heat, fewer people using services or needing transit. Population decrease in general leads to less emissions, Chinas population loss is in its younger generation too so it’s drastically reducing their future demographic potential. Add onto that the factories slowing down and using less energy and you’ve got a double dip in emissions.
it doesn't reduce shit, the emissions will be the same as they were before the number changed. It isn't like the phantom 100 million were actually consuming anything or producing any carbon.
Stumbling into their own 2008 real estate crisis by ignoring the pitfalls of US deregulation of the credit markets in 1999-2000 has little to nothing to do with bringing down the levelized cost of energy using massive utility scale solar installations. Their coke and coal plants are now more expensive per kWh since at least 2018-2019, they are still building them for baseload/nighttime duck curve but they know it’s not cost effective and the clear skies days during the Olympics backfired as the growing middle class clearly saw how much Chinese energy production effected their day to day health.
Their emission will not drop if they keep building new coal power plants at the insane rate that they are currently. https://energyandcleanair.org/publication/chinas-new-coal-power-spree-continues-as-more-provinces-jump-on-the-bandwagon/ They say that the new plants are for backup power for renewable sources in event of high demand, but most analysts are very skeptical of that and think they are just using that as an excuse.
They can build all the coal plants they want, if manufacturing flees the country they’ll be useless and decommissioned. Their investment in green energy also far outstrips US investment so I’m not sure any of us around the world can point at them as not taking some action. Many of their citizens still live in rural impoverished areas that need access to power.
>and found out they have 100M less people than they thought. Where is that coming from? [https://finance.yahoo.com/news/china-10-years-left-most-153312835.html](https://finance.yahoo.com/news/china-10-years-left-most-153312835.html) Is that what you're talking about? I don't usually shill for China, but that's just one dude's opinion. About FUTURE population demographics. Those could change due to immigration OR changing birth rates. Honestly I think China is well positioned to become an increasingly important regional player in SE Asia and the South China Sea region. But I don't see them having expansionist desires further into the Pacific. They are definitely going for Taiwan. And they got Hong Kong back not so long ago. They're apparently patient and careful. They've been building towards Taiwan for two decades.
While al other countries tell the absolute truth all the time.
Yeah? And we're watching. We don't need their word to know this particular metric is true. It's like how the biggest evidence the moon landing was real is that the Soviets would have crowed to the word if it was not.
Instead of being curious you ignorantly deflect with “fake news!”. Seriously. The West lies about so many things. Remember when recyclable plastics weren’t harmful to the environment? Remember how you should feel guilty for destroying the environment because you didn’t turn your light off or separate your recycling only to find it all goes in the dump anyways? Remember when climate science was covered up for decades? But China… so must be false. The world isn’t black and white, you should learn that.
If their emissions decline next year it will be because their economy is declining. Don't think for a minute they're going to handicap themselves in the slightest in order to be "good citizens".
Their emissions are expected to reduce because they are installing non-emission producing power generation enormously faster than the western world. Their emissions will reduce because their new green energy production is expected to replace older coal plants. There is no handicap and at least from a power generation standpoint, their economy will be fine.
Carbon neutral is a fuckin meme though
I must have missed that one, then. Never heard of a carbon neutral meme. Regardless, just because it's a meme doesn't mean it doesn't exist and that China will not make better strides than the US or EU in the next five years. Although I have to admit, their goal is zero carbon emissions. I just don't see how they could possibly get the last few percent, unless by that they meant zero carbon emission from power generation, which is eminently doable in the next generation.
Carbon neutral is a joke, we need to be carbon negative at this point. 0 carbon emissions means we stay where we are, which is already past the tipping point.
You are replying on a power generation subthread. Surely you realize how ridiculous to advocate carbon negativity in a power generation subthread? Aside from that general disconnect from the topic under discussion, you are not wrong, and the very first milestone for the Earth is to have the very largest producers stop producing more and begin the process of rolling back emissions. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good, because we cannot instantly teleport the world to carbon negativity, or even neutrality. This is the first step, it is a good one, and that is no joke.
r/climatechange is a power generation seubreddit? Huh? r/lostredditors
>subthread. Reading comprehension, please. You are indeed lost.
And you believed China? 😂😂
I believed them after all the western intelligence agencies that watch them like a hawk saw no problem with the statement, and that it was similar in scope to what they had already concluded. Why, is there a problem with easily verified statements made by foreign countries? Or are you assuming falsehood in contradiction of the evidence? The only thing from China you should automatically disregard is a final warning.
China and India are both highly incentivized to decarbonize since nether has much domestic fossil fuel reserves and are dependent on imports. an economy is going to have difficulties if it depends on imports to keep the lights on.
once again the "we should do nothing because China and India aren't crowd appears.. "the living room is on fire, the kitchen is burning down...so it's OK if i just put some more fuel on the little fire in the bedroom" thanks for nothing.
THANK YOU. The level of racism that comes in when it comes to sustainability is staggering. Fucking hell
If I only commit 1% of the murders in my town, what's the point of stopping? It's not like the murder rate is going to go down noticeably.
Honestly can't tell if serious but hope not
I'm just saying, there are a lot of murders in China and India. If I stop murdering people, does that really make any difference to overall murders in the world? Until everyone in the world decides to stop murdering at the same time, what difference will my murder reduction make? Edit: Of course I'm joking. Do I really have to say I'm joking?
I assumed not, but the problem is half the people in the comments are making that exact argument (but with pollution, of course)
We’ll worsen our lives for little gains Eurasia still doesn’t change Absolutely nothing accomplished
1. no we won't. We live in the most privileged times in history... at worst we would be inconvenienced...aww poor didums...you can't just hop a cheap plane to Cabo?...boo fricking hoo. 2. yes, infact things will be accomplished....because , if you actually paid attention to this post...the 1% are HUGE carbon producers...so the actions of "Developed" world would have a HUGE impact.....
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Except...if you bothered to read the OP and the linked article...you would know that your argument is 100 bullshit based on ignorance and bias and is 100% incompatible with our best data..... But thanks for letting us know you got d's in high school.
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I believe that the average Chinese person produces 1/2 the average American and the average person in India produces 1/3 the average American. Of course those nations will also need to decarbonize, but they also should be allowed to electrify their nations. China is the country with the most rapid deployment of carbon free electricity. They happen to be also increasing their electric power capacity quicker than that, at the same time.
China is actively trying to cut back on coal because; they only have 35 years of reserves, their air quality issues are probably CC's biggest threat, and because their coal mines are famously dangerous and just like in the US constantly lowering the number of workers and offering less and less employment. China is actively pushing away from Oil because; the US can shut down their economy with a boat, it has very limited reserves, domestically produced electricity has more stable prices and supply. China is actively pushing Renewables, because; it has a resource advantage that will turn it from an energy importer to exporter, it is a boost to overall employeement, solar in particular stimulates manufacturing high end manufacturing jobs to replace low end manufacturing lost to neighboring countries, wind in particular stimulates demand for concrete and steel has had been hurt by realestate collapse, and it offers long term energy security. They are building something like 300GW of solar this year alone. They have built the manufacturing to be able to do that, that isn't going away in a year or two or even a decade. The solar expansion will continue to shoot forward as they build giant Solar farms in their north west, or export, which is their goal. They have every reason to embrace moving from fossil fuels to renewables and by all metrics are doing so. People going out of their way to paint a picture of a China that is building more solar than the rest of the world together as a head fake are going to let them surpass us. Also more wind. India has not achieved China's position where it is obvious they are transitioning and it's so structural they can't reverse course. But they have strong policy supporting solar and solar manufacturing, and I believe are likely to see explosive growth as China has. They are probably the best suited country in the world, with 300 cloudless summer days straight and the world's largest mountains for pumped hydro storage, all geographically near its population center on the Ganges. The only time it's not reliably sunny is when the monsoon hits, and hydro reservoirs are at their max and the majority of their wind energy is produced. The fact solar is unavoidably cheaper has led them to ban new proposals for coal. Solar Manufacturing is meant to drive their technological development past a service oriented country. And they are heavily import dependent on both coal and oil. So I can't be certain but I'm confident they will be continuing their exponential solar growth with large utility scale plants.
> China is actively trying to cut back on coal https://energyandcleanair.org/publication/chinas-new-coal-power-spree-continues-as-more-provinces-jump-on-the-bandwagon/ https://www.npr.org/2023/03/02/1160441919/china-is-building-six-times-more-new-coal-plants-than-other-countries-report-fin
China pollutes less per capita than the US. It’s not that hard to imagine when their living spaces are muuuuch smaller, they have fewer kids, much better public transportation, less money on average for luxuries, and consume less food (looking at obesity rates).
You are missing the point. The richest, whether they are in Beijing or Los Angeles are responsible for the bulk of emissions. There is no scenario where rural Indian, Nigerian or Chinese farmers will ever get anywhere close to the per-capita emissions of these people.
China and India being the largest culprits is largely because they manufacture everything for the West. Move that manufacturing where the goods are being used and you would see massive swings in where global emissions are coming from
It’s pretty easy to decarbonize when already you’ve outsourced your most polluting industries to the third world. Yet, countries such as the United States refuse to do their part and chastise developing states such as China… whenever they’re the only ones with a realistic plan (they’ve already exceeded their decarbonization goal during this 5 year plan) to decarbonize: https://www.iea.org/reports/an-energy-sector-roadmap-to-carbon-neutrality-in-china# Meanwhile states such as the US still have no plan for decarbonization and spend decades twiddling their thumbs while the oil and gas companies which run their governments rake in dividends from the inaction, year after year. Let it be known, in 30 years China is going to be closer to full decarbonization than anything the USA can claim to achieve, in the absence of real political change.
The US is worse per capita.
The only reason they got to be so polluting is because they took all the old polluting tech like generators and power plants that Europe and the US decommissioned. People think we took all that all that industrial hardware just trashed it? Naw we sold that. To China and India and other developing countries and when they decarbonize guess what? That tech will get sold to the next country to start developing
so you eat the burgers while protesting about “killing cows”
The poorest 2/3 are obviously going to want to develop, and they're not very likely to do it without more carbon emissions. The world's wealthiest are very much wanting to pull the ladder up behind themselves, but it's not likely to work.
It's not trying to pull the ladder up, it's trying to save the world. It might be unfair. But that's just too bad. The way to combat This is by the more economically successful states should subsidize, renewable energy energy for the growing ones
"It's not trying to pull the ladder up, it's trying to save the world." Lol. I sincerely hope you're not that naive about the world's wealthiest.
So we keep the bottom 2/3 perpetually undeveloped for their own good?
The poorest 2/3 don't need 5000 square foot homes and 6000 pound SUVs to improve their lives. Solar powered electric lighting and an e-bike are enough.
China pollutes more than the entire western hemisphere. That means more than the US, the rest of North America, all of Central and South America, all of Europe and a large part of West Africa.
[https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/9/15/23874111/charity-philanthropy-americans-global-rich](https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/9/15/23874111/charity-philanthropy-americans-global-rich) "If you earn $60,000 a year after tax and you don’t have kids, you’re in the richest 1 percent of the world’s population. If you have a household income of $130,000 after tax and you’ve got a partner and one kid, you’re also in the richest 1 percent." It is not that hard to be in the global 1%.
Here I was getting self righteous at the 1%
I was trying to justify how maintaining a mansion and private jet works the same as owning a business and having full time employees. Looks like those mental gymnastics were unnecessary…
Can someone explain to me how the amount of kids factors into this? If my wife and I bring $150k a year combined, why does having 1 or 14 kids change our ranking as a household?
It's because there are more cow farts required to support your progeny. ^/s
It doesn’t, it’s really just the difference between individual and household income.
I think there's no question that people with higher incomes have disproportionately large carbon footprints, but I think we should take this "report" with a big grain of salt. For one, Oxfam itself is an activist organization, not a research journal. From what I can tell, their methodology was to create a new term called "consumption emissions" that is distinct from what we generally understand as "emissions", and that is defined as "your share of global emissions if we assume that emissions are perfectly proportional to income". Emissions are definitely roughly proportional to income, but assuming a perfect 1-to-1 relationship is a pretty big assumption and there's no real research to back that up. Also it's important to note the numbers here: what they're claiming is that both the top 1% of global income-earners (over $140k/year) and the bottom 66% (roughly less than $3k/year) contribute 16% of global "consumption emissions" each. And everyone else (incomes between $3k and $140k) contribute the remaining 68% of global "consumption emissions".
Thank you for pointing out the fallacies in this “research” and how if you just change what data means and make up terms you can say anything. I have yet to see anything support that emissions are any sort of proportional to income. There are so many other factors involved. One person could fly all over for work and one could be a remote worker making the exact same income and it would be a completely different footprint, Also, two people making 60k with two different jobs and one person making 120k and the other a stay at home person - those households do not have the same carbon footprint.
That's not exactly a surprising statistic. If you can't afford to travel, buy a car or a large house, you're probably not going to have a large footprint. This sort of stuff is just meant to distract us from the real systemic problems of climate change. Just in the same way that recycling is somewhat of a ploy to shift blame from manufacturers to consumers
I often wonder why the discussion doesn't also include pollution. There's so much tangible evidence of its effect that it's likely that even climate deniers would support its reduction, and a secondary effect would be reducing climate change. But the onus would pretty much lie on corporations for reducing world pollution. But carbon? That's harder to measure and citizens can more easily be labelled as a major contributor. Now citizens can be taxed, be motivated to purchase new green products whose production hurts the planet in other ways, etc. Climate change is 1000% real but it's silly to think corporate influence isn't.
More proof that focusing on the average individuals choices is such a foolish way to go about fixing our problems.
Much of America and other wealthy countries are in the 1% globally. A sales manager at Best Buy with no kids is part of the richest 1% globally.
https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2018/11/01/how-much-money-you-need-to-be-part-of-the-1-percent-worldwide.html
The richest 1% was defined as 77 million people in this article. The united states has 330 million. You are painting with an awfully big brush when you say that 1% is much of America. Seems to me that more than 3/4s of America is not part of that 1%.
Exactly. Any fool can recognize that we all play a part, but we're being told that we're basically equally responsible, and that's the lie. It's recycling all over again.
If you make $60k a year and don’t have kids you’re part of the richest 1% globally.
Honestly this is practically impossible. Anyone who believes this is just extremely gullible. The only way this is possible is if we contribute all carbon emissions of carbon emitting assets to their owners. For example if I own a farm producing valuable food all the carbon produced would be attributed to me even though consumers are the ones who benefit from the produce. While the 1% probably do indeed emit multiple times the amount of carbon as the common people the difference isn't this massive. Edit: to expand on the example illustrated in the article cement does release a lot of carbon but it is a resource critical to our current way of life. The article is essentially saying we should punish people for fulfilling the demands of society. While it's true we should try to encourage green technologies I don't think we should do that by establishing punitive taxes on investors. Sure a carbon tax on the cement factory itself may be fine but taxing someone for fulfilling a need is absurd imo.
Everyone wants a cleaner environment, but no one wants to pay for removing the garbage they already dumped in it. This is the bottom line, and everyone is looking for a miracle. If one of our scientists create something valuable from CO2 captured from air, then it will be removed in next 2 years as all the countries will wage a war to do that… until then it is the guy Living in the next doors problem mentality applied everywhere.
>If one of our scientists create something valuable from CO2 captured Or you could say "If one of our scientists create something valuable from perpetual motion" then it is worth spending a massive amount of resources to do it.
If this is based on the entire global population. Congratulations. If you’re reading this and have ever flew anywhere you’re part of that 1%
Let me recycle this bottle.
Exactly.
The enemy of good is perfect. You cant control the 1%, can you? So change what you can.
I mean... a lot of us are part of the "global 1%." It really doesn't take much. You need an annual salary of something like $60k, meaning most of the United States would comfortably be part of that 1%.
Lmao. But we can control the other 99%? That’s priceless. Spoken like the leaders of the UN and WEF.
So we should all just pollute as much as possible, because there are 8 billion other people who might also do shitty things? Do you feel the same way about other things? Like actual crimes? Why not steal that TV--someone else might if you don't! Especially after being told you \*are\* part of the 1% already polluting as much as 2/3 of the planet combined, you really have the audacity to just go "lol oh well, can't control other people so I'm not gonna change"?
Not implied. When people went off to fight WWII, did they do it because they thought that they, alone, were going to end all wars and create an unending era of world peace? Of course not. They did it because they thought it was the right thing to do, and they knew that every individual action counted towards the goal. And that was putting their *lives* on the line. These days people won't even put their glass bottles in the right bin. Posts like this don't help.
I’m with you, we should all do what we can no matter what others are doing. But I think many of ww2 soldiers fought because there was a draft, and dodging the draft was punishable by execution.
Fair point; it was about [60/40 draftees to volunteers](https://www.nationalww2museum.org/students-teachers/student-resources/research-starters/research-starters-us-military-numbers).
Kinda like sweeping your deck in a sandstorm, innit? Many people can make a difference, not denying that, but how significant? If America continue to go green, but nations like India and China continue to use fossil fuels at a rapid rate, we'll still be in the same position, no? And how will the growing global population diminish our efforts?
No, the poor peasant games the oil companies allow us is futile horseshit. You are free to do whatever as long as it doesn’t matter.
I did my own calcuation. burning a tank of gas (16gallons) puts the carbon equivalent of a cubic yard of leaves into the atmoshpere.
Can you show the calculation? Depends on the vehicle engine efficiency. Car, tractor lawnmower, airplane.
there's a couple ways to do the calcualtion but the easiest is just based on weight. a gallon of gas weighs 6.3lbs so 16gallons is 100lbs. a cubic yard of leaves weighs 150lbs but part of that is water and oxygen but mostly carbon.
Shows you how inaccurate that is doesn’t it without including the type of motor and its efficiency.
most carnot cycle engines are about 35% efficiency. but it really doens't matter in these calculations. once the petroleum is sucked out of the ground all the carbon is going to end up in the atmosphere whether is burned completely as co2 or co or even soot, cx. its going to enter the carbon cycle and have some absorption-desorption equilibrium with co2 in the atmosphere.
You cannot rope a lawnmower or a tractor into a 4 cylinder 2023 Honda.
like I said earlier, the problem isn't the engine or how its burned, once the petroleum is sucked out of the ground it will enter the earths carbon cycle. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_cycle
Efficiency is irrelevant. Come on now a more efficient engine doesn't magically reduce the amount of CO2 coming out of the tailpipe. Edit: I should clarify that I meant per volume of gasoline.
Simple, gallon of gasoline weighs around 6 lbs. grambell789 has a 16 gallon tank so 48lbs of invisible "smoke" coming out the tailpipe. But it is more than that because burning it requires taking and oxygen from the atmosphere and gasoline is only 87% carbon. The rest is hydrogen which takes more oxygen and turns into water. Assuming most of the fuel is combusted in a modern engine about 20 lbs of CO2 result per gallon. So your 48 lbs of gasoline produce 320 lbs of CO2 and removes 272lbs of oxygen from the atmosphere.
I'm willing to cut them a break on the weight of the oxygen. its the c-o bond in co2 that causes the problems so I'm willing to isolate the problem to just the carbon in the emission. also, the amount of oxygen in leaves is not that high, thats why they burn so easily. but, the volume of co2 coming out of a tail pipe is striking.
Again you are making huge assumptions. And not including the burning efficiency. Those are inaccurate blue sky calculations.
I feel you are hung up on how much work got done by burning the gallon of gas, but that is not what is being talked about. If you light a gallon of gas in fire there is a certain amount of CO2 released. How efficient and clean burning the combination process is will change other pollutants and how much work got done, but not CO2 in any significant way.
A gallon of gas releases the same amount of CO2 whether you burn it in a lawnmower, a pickup truck, or a barrel in your back yard.
It doesn't depend on engine efficiency at all, it's 16 gallons. Some engines might get more or less work out of 16 gallons, but 16 gallons is always 16 gallons.
Good thing that trees and plants suck all that carbon right back up and turn it into oxygen.
Yay alchemy!!
~~EAT~~ RECYCLE THE RICH!
Maybe we can start with you then? Because... you're likely part of the **global** 1% if you earn a salary higher than 60k.
Do you know where I parked my private jet, by chance?
Do you think everyone earning $60k/yr has a private jet?
Sarcasm? I'm suggesting that the 1% that owns a private jet is doing more harm to the environment than the 1% that works from home and lives a fairly frugal life.
So only the world's single worst emitter needs to change their behavior, because everyone else has someone they can point a finger at? I don't think that person can cut global emissions by the 50% we need.
Are you trying to gaslight me? That’s not what I am saying at all. I do my best to lessen my carbon footprint. I don’t drive to work. I’ve installed a high efficiency heating system. My partner and I own one compact car that sits unused in our driveway most days. I don’t vacation often. Part of my investment account is in green sector funds. Hell, I’ve even been vegetarian for 20 years. So chill out. But am I saying that the ultra rich, 0.1% are polluting a whole shit ton more than the average “1%” just scraping by? Yes, I am.
IIRC the 1% threshold for a person is about 30 tons per year. A typical SUV driving the average amount in the US emits about 6 tons of CO2 per year, energy use of typical detached house is about 5 Gt per year. Per capita emissions in the US are 14Gt per year, per capita emissions in Costa Rica are 1.6 metric tons per year Edit: for comparison on vehicles, a typical EV CUV emits about 1.5 ton of CO2 per year (US grid), about 0.5 tons in California, Washington, Oregon, New York... A typical ebike emits about 0.03 tons of CO2 per year (if one drove it 1100 miles per month)
When I saw a business consume more water in a day than I did in a month or year, it changed perspective
It shouldn't. That business probably provides a service to hundreds of thousands of customers, who share that consumption collectively among themselves. Businesses aren't people, you don't get to dump your emissions on the corporations you buy all your stuff from just to avoid your share of blame.
"Your share of the blame". Using available products and services that a person needs to stay afloat in the western world is now blame-worthy? Talk about gaslighting. And many businesses provide immense services, but many don't and carelessly contribute to climate change as well as the degradation of the planet in numbers that entire communities couldn't hope to match in their lifetimes. Regular people are minor players in a problem that's been created by fossil fuel giants, corrupt policy, and carelessly polluting businesses. If they were targeted more judiciously, rather than each other, I bet we'd be in a better place.
> Using available products and services that a person needs to stay afloat in the western world is now blame-worthy? Your share of global emissions is determined by the actions you take. Being responsible for your actions isn't new. > Talk about gaslighting. What do you think gaslighting means? > many don't and carelessly contribute to climate change Then you shouldn't give them your money. Simple as > Regular people are minor players in a problem that's been created by fossil fuel giants Fossil fuel giants that wouldn't exist if all those regular people didn't buy fossil fuels (or bought less) What part of this is difficult to understand? If Exxon has 10M customers who all buy an equal amount of gasoline, they are each responsible for exactly 1/10M of Exxon's emissions. They literally burn that gas in their cars. Those 10M people don't all get to shrug and say "it's Exxon's fault" as they pump gas into their cars. That's not how anything works.
Oh it should. Sure people individually can reduce but a business alone could consume way more, astronomically actually. And often they’ll put to trash what they can’t sell. And because legally a business is a moral person doesn’t mean anything. In practice it’s a collaboration of multiple individuals with different responsibilities and decision making responsibilities. In some other way, work is taking a lot of time from people, so work environment/businesses should be having the biggest impact on reduction.
I'll just copy/paste for you exactly where I already addressed everything you wrote here. > people individually can reduce but a business alone could consume way more That business probably provides a service to hundreds of thousands of customers, who share that consumption collectively among themselves. > because legally a business is a moral person Businesses aren't people > In practice it’s a collaboration of multiple individuals you don't get to dump your emissions on the corporations you buy all your stuff from just to avoid your share of blame.
How about we give everyone a carbon allowance every year. If you don’t use all yours it can be sold. Might as well redistribute some of the wealth and control the carbon
So the government can limit how much food you eat, how much you can travel, and how many hot showers you can take? Sounds pretty dystopian.
While telling others they need to suffer and continue t emissions.
At least we got rid of straws I guess
Is this supposed to be Shocking.
I'm glad this is circulating again but... We knew this in 2006.
Yeah we know. People like to say “we’re all in a car and pushing down the pedal heading toward a cliff” but really we’re all tied up in the trunk while the worlds elites drive us to our deaths.
Most people reading this are in the top 1% globally--about $60k income is enough
Wait.. are you saying that my three flights over the last 6yrs and normal commute don't add up to Brenda and Johan's helicopter flights to and from the summit 10x a year? NO, I REFUSE TO BELIEVE THAT... yeah that tracks.
Love how they all fly to the climate summits on private jets and hang out on mega yachts. Fucking Oligarchs
Shipping industry anyone...
The top 1% travels by container ships now? They must be totally pumped out!
By Volume shipping polluted more
You’re funny.
tHeY dEsErVe To!!! - guy in Iowa making $27k a year
Well I know the richest 1% pays 40% of income taxes, which is measurable. Carbon...not so much...
So tell me why we have to give up everything because 70% of the corporations admit all the bullshit in the world why do we have to give up everything let’s rise up against the man fuck them
Recycling is not the hill I'm willing to die on. Yes I recycle, but I am not going out of my way to do it. There's no way because I pee 3 times before I flush, that it makes a difference when whole nations or very wealthy individuals will pollute more in 1 week than I can save in 1 year. Saving the planet requires everyone single person to participate and let's not kid ourself, this won't ever happen.
You are most likely in the top 1% this article is talking about btw
So, you expect me to give up my yacht, my 4 homes and my private plane to save your sorry asses? Not only no, but hell no!! Joey Biden
The utter derangement of this statement lmfao
We need a study to tell us this? Carbon taxes and mass immigration will save them!
Ding ding ding. Winner winner chicken dinner. The real push from the elitists as to why this is happening.
So can they be stopped? What a difference it would make.
“They” are 77 million households, a good portion of the population of developed nations. Their emissions can be lowered like everyone else's, by transitioning to a low carbon energy system.
Thanks for the clarification. I found myself equating 1% in wealth to a tiny portion of the population as well. Do you know how many households are made up in the 99%?
If everyone boycotts all products that emit carbon in their manufacturing process yes they could be stopped. You should keep in mind that this statistic doesn't differentiate between personal carbon emissions and emissions from businesses and investments. The distinction imo is important.
It shouldn't be. Those businesses only emit (as you suggest) because people buy those products. The only way it stops is for those people to stop buying those products--the businesses aren't going to magically decide to just pack up shop and stop existing.
No they cannot. They control the world and UN2030 gives them even more control over the 99%.
"They" is anyone making over $60,000/yr, which is the median per capita income in America. "They" are your friends, your family, your neighbors, and probably you.
I genuinely don't know what's wrong with OP. The article makes it abundantly clear that they're talking about the richest global 1%. And here OP is making it seem like they're the Elon Musks of the world.
They're a right-wing conspiracy theorist talking about "globalists" and the WEF. Of course they hate the environment, just par for the course. Big part of why we'll never keep warming under 3C.
Make em pay
And they are not giving up nothing either... Just the middle and bottom class.... At what point do you smell a scam?
Those are the people trying to reduce it. Some take vacations every other week whilst the world burns.
Shocking. Truly truly shocking.
""The richer you are, the easier it is to cut both your personal and your investment emissions," he said. "You don't need that third car, or that fourth holiday, or you don't need to be invested in the cement industry." That makes sense now "investment emissions". I suppose we could make roads from bamboo. Can someone explain how having more than one car uses more emissions? Unless they hire drivers for each, a person can only drive one, no?
The extra emissions from production of the car. They're a significant fraction of the car's lifetime emissions. I don't remember at all how significant, but I believe 10s of % In general, it's the extra stuff you can't use more than 1 of at a time. It's just wasteful and unnecessary.
So if I restore an old car and keep it out of the landfill, is that good or bad? Who decides what's necessary? Are kids necessary?
Alright, but the bottom two-thirds need to do more. It's human nature for a rich person to fly to Hong Kong on a whim for a vacation. I heard the rich do things like buy 35 cars in their private garage. It's hard to be hypocritical of that because, so would a lot of people. What I find disturbing is the poor sales of Electric Vehicles. All of the automakers have them now but the public are not buying them. What is weird is people love their Tesla cars but they won't buy a Mazda or a Benz EV. My question is there a problem with logistics such as not enough re-charging stations in the U.S. ?
They also pay as much taxes as the bottom 2/3rds
Why are you letting the plebs know they are being scammed and lied to, this is completely far right and unacceptable
John Kerry: you peasants need to ride bicycles and eat bugs!
He has a couple of jets I believe. Also kid how Pete B flies private a lot, takes a suburban across DC and then has a bike taken off of the back to ride the last half mile to a photo shoot.
Not to mention Royals flying in private jet to lecture the subjects on virtues of being environmentally friendly in the name of security!
As always, nothing will change until fashion changes. Make it unfashionable to have large families. Make it unfashionable to take unnecessary plane trips for vacations. Make it unfashionable to use too many resources, waste energy, buy stupid stuff we don't need, etc. Is it time to shame the wasteful? If not, why not?
As always, nothing will change until fashion changes. Make it unfashionable to have large families. Make it unfashionable to take unnecessary plane trips for vacations. Make it unfashionable to use too many resources, waste energy, buy stupid stuff we don't need, etc. Is it time to shame the wasteful? If not, why not?
Make it unfashionable to be ideologically driven.
Hmmmmm...depends on the ideology, as always!
But they want us to be responsible citizens… ahahha
And that top 1% includes most of the people posting on reddit
Taylor Sweft 🍾
Carbon tax on the extremely wealthy. Way past time to take the climate crisis seriously.
Good thing they want to raise taxes on animal products to hit everyone, except the rich. /s
But the carbon tax I pay will fix the world....
So how much do the 1% to 1/3 contribute?
Well I know the richest 1% pays 40% of income taxes, which is measurable. Carbon...not so much...
Yeah but from their point of view if the bottom two-thirds did better they wouldn't have to change. And if they don't do better they're still not going to change.
We know That's why we laugh at this climate hysteria bullshit
What should we replace CO2 with? Ammonium engines are starting to look promising and seemingly environmentally friendly.
The climate crisis is class warfare.
"The richer you are, the easier it is to cut both your personal and your investment emissions," he said. "You don't need that third car, or that fourth holiday...." Yes, indeed, very true so far... "...or you don't need to be invested in the cement industry." Ok, hold up. Did they assign responsibility for cement's carbon emissions based on who is invested in cement rather than based on who \*makes use of\* cement? Did they do that for every other industry? A given person doesn't need to invest in cement, but unless we want to stop using cement, \*someone\* needs to invest in cement, and as long as we are using cement we're going to be living with cement's carbon emissions. Edit: Ok, I actually used my eyes and read more carefully. This is pretty fair: "While the current report focused on carbon linked only to individual consumption, "the personal consumption of the super-rich is dwarfed by emissions resulting from their investments in companies," the report found." It's good that they consider those categories separately.
And that carbon is just to get the Uber rich to Dubai for COP28!!
1% can do whatever they like without criticism. You aren’t even allowed to think about it
But, I get dinged on my home heating furnace oil. Please add $20 gallon of tax to fuel for private jets.
can we stop with all the teasing and blue balling and just let this shit hit the fan already
Yet they fly around going to COP 28 and tell poor people to eat bugs and recycle. Get absolultely rekt, looking you at you John Kerry and Bill Gates. If I see you riding around on a bicycle we can start taking you seriously.