Cont: Global warming discussion V

[Roger Ramjets]

Interesting, I don't recall suggestion, anywhere, ever, that we put the brakes on renewable energy. Yes, taking drastic measures is unrealistic, that's been my whole point all along.

Er, no - your 'point' was "Despite your "facts" global CO2 levels are still rising. Debunk that.". The implications is clear - we aren't doing enough.

I never suggested or implied that drastic measures need to be applied - but you just did. I'm saying we just need to stay the course.

Problem is people have different ideas of what 'drastic' means. For many it's doing anything other than business as usual - by which they mean $757 billion per year in subsidies for oil and gas in the US alone, while removing any incentives for clean energy and even applying punitive taxes and artificial restrictions on their use. Of course it also means screaming blue murder about plans to reduce tailpipe emissions to zero on most new cars by 2035 (a decade away) and encouraging the use of electricity over gas (which I did back in 1978). Many of these people also constantly bleat the entire gamut of denier talking points, from more CO2 is good for us to EVs are dirtier than gas cars - because to them 'drastic' means any change to their lifestyle at all, even when it will be good for them. They would rather wallow in filth and die than get out of their comfort zone.

This Ludditism is what's holding us back. Everybody's so worried about upsetting the applecart that they don't notice the apples are going rotten due to their inaction. Or perhaps they do, but have resigned themselves to letting them rot because moving any of them is too 'drastic'. Some have even convinced themsleves that rotten apples are better!

 

[Stout]

Er, no - your 'point' was "Despite your "facts" global CO2 levels are still rising. Debunk that.". The implications is clear - we aren't doing enough.

I never suggested or implied that drastic measures need to be applied - but you just did. I'm saying we just need to stay the course.

Yes, I've been saying we need drastic measures since, well, since forever. Do we really want to avoid 1.5C or is that just a buzzword because staying the course (although the most realistic course of action) sure isn't going to get it done.

Deniers gonna deny, always have, always will. I've been more than clear on what I mean by drastic and nobody wants that, not even the people stressing out about there being no Planet B.

 

[The Great Zaganza]

‘Explosive increase’ of ticks that cause meat allergy in US due to climate crisis

The Guardian Unusually aggressive lone star ticks, common in the south-east, are spreading to areas previously too cold for them. Blood-sucking ticks that trigger a bizarre allergy to meat in the p…

www.unmc.edu

Woke Ticks turning Red Blooded Americans into Vegetarians!

 

[dann]

Ugh.

I have only recently learned (i.e. yesterday) that there is an industrial disease named after chimney sweeps, it's a form of cancer on the scrotum caused by exposure to soot and minerals created by fires.

Chimney sweeps' carcinoma - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Yes, there was a very similar cancer of the scrotum in cotton-mule spinners who were exposed to oil based on fossil fuels.
Even 100 years ago, contrarian doctors came up with alternative explanations:

Mineral oil and alternative theories (Wikipedia)
There were, however, skeptics. Alternative theories included those such as the spinners were more susceptible to this cancer because they wore less clothing than wool spinners, and, notably, there was the issue of lack of underpants. Dr. Robertson argued the cancer was caused by stretching while piecing. In stretching, abrasion was caused by upward pull and consequent tightening of overalls dragging on the scrotum. Others blamed it on the want of bodily cleanliness.

Nowadays, I guess they would blame it on the mRNA vaccines and/or woke!

 

[dann]

From a thread on X today:

Jason Hickle on X, July 6, 2025
Who is driving climate breakdown? Buckle up for some striking data...
1. First, global North countries are responsible for 86% of cumulative emissions in excess of the safe planetary boundary.
China is responsible for 1%. The rest of the South and peripheral Europe is responsible for 13%.
These results arise from taking the safe carbon budget and dividing into national "fair shares" on a per-capita basis, and then assessing national emissions against national fair-shares.

Notice that it's based on "cumulative CO2 emissions from 1850-2019" and even Australia and New Zealand are "Global North".

Lorna Taylor on X, July 6, 2025
Yet the constant narrative I hear from friends and family is ‘when China does something about climate change, then maybe I’ll start to make changes’

Jason Hickel on X, July 6, 2025
6. Another way to look at responsibility is in terms of class. This graph shows it's the rich who are mostly responsible for excess emissions.
Millionaires alone are on track to burn 72% of the remaining carbon budget for 1.5C. This is an egregious assault on humanity and the living world and none of us should accept it.
https://globalinequality.org/carbon-inequality/

Jason Hickel on X, July 6, 2025
7. Here we can see the inequalities by class AND by country. Note that the highest 10% of emitters in China and India emit less than the bottom 50% in the USA.
The US ruling class is... wild.

Jason Hickel on X, July 6, 2025
8. But there's a problem. The two graphs above show emissions from household consumption. But it's more important to account for who controls investment and PRODUCTION, since those are the people who have the power to produce differently, eg by using renewable energy, or by investing in less damaging industries.
In the USA, the richest 1% are responsible for 6% of consumption emissions... but 43% of emissions associated with capital ownership. Thus, their responsibility jumps up to 27% of total national emissions.
Using a similar method, research by Oxfam finds that billionaires are each responsible for one million times more emissions than the average person in the bottom 90% of humanity.

 

[dann]

Meanwhile, Canada is busy greenwashing its fossil-fuel extraction:

Ottawa announces funding for 5 Alberta carbon capture projects (CBC.ca, July 4, 2025)
$21.5M coming from Energy Innovation Program
(...)
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has pitched a "grand bargain" where that emissions-cutting project would go ahead in tandem with a new crude oil pipeline to the West Coast, which no company has thus far proposed to build.

Carbon Capture and Storage (Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis)
An unproven technology that cannot meet planetary CO2 mitigation needs
Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is an expensive and unproven technology that distracts from global decarbonization efforts while allowing the oil and gas industry to conduct business as usual.
Even if realized at its full announced potential, CCS will only account for about 2.4% of the world’s carbon mitigation by 2030, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It’s worth noting that not one single CCS project has ever reached its target CO2 capture rate.

Gorgon CCS underperformance hits new low in 2023-24 (Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, Nov 28, 2024)
Key Findings
In the last financial year, the Gorgon CCS project captured only 30% of the CO2 it removed from its reservoir, its weakest performance to date.
As a result of technical challenges and underperformance, the cost per tonne of CO2 captured increased again in the last year to $222.
The technical challenges faced by the world’s largest CCS project are not unique; most large CCS projects globally have failed or underperformed materially.

 

[Stout]

Hummm...emissions must fall to 2.3/cap by 2030 to stay under 1.5C. That's totally going to happen.

Speaking of

WTF Palau

 

[dann]

No, that's probably not going to happen, but not because of Palau:

"CO2 emissions per capita in Palau are equivalent to 76.41 tons per person (based on a population of 17,759 in 2022)"
Countries like the USA, Canada and Australia are much more relevant in this context.
Tons per capita:
USA 14.21
Canada 14.99
Australia 15.01

Other countries are doing much, much better and are on their way to 2.3:
UK 5
Italy 5.42
France 4.76
Spain 5.32
Sweden 3.61
Switzerland 4.11
Denmark 4.94

Hong Kong 4.34

Cuba 2.24 was already there in 2022, and thanks to the Chinese solar panels the Cubans are probably far below that at this point.

As mentioned before, in comparison to countries like the USA, Canada and Australia, even China 8.89 is doing much better and will probably see considerable improvements by 2030 while contributing to the decrease of CO₂ emissions in the rest of the world - again unlike the USA, Canada and Australia.

And this is obviously before any distinction between the class differences in CO₂ emissions as pointed out in post 1,965.
The oligarchs don't just ruin the lives of their workers. They ruin living conditions on the whole bloody planet.

 

[Stout]

Other countries are doing much, much better and are on their way to 2.3:
UK 5
Italy 5.42
France 4.76
Spain 5.32
Sweden 3.61
Switzerland 4.11
Denmark 4.94

Impressive numbers on the surface however once you factor in the rate in decrease of emissions, that impressiveness dissipates like the tailpipe emissions from a Ford F-150. Except for Denmark. Hats off to Denmark for getting it done. Still have to cut those emissions in half though, in the next five years and now that coal is over, there's not a lot of cuts left to be made without kerbstomping the western lifestyle. Oh, let's factor in emissions from all the foreign manufacturing and shipping needed to maintain that lifestyle, just for fun, like the inclusion of Palau's carbon footprint.

Yep, the big countries are pretty much screwed and they're certainly not going to shine or EV their way to 2.3T. Why, you ask? Here's an example. They're just finishing off a brand new eco friendly building down the street and the love to complain about climate change types are complaining about...wait for it...the units in the building not being large enough and some of the bedrooms not having windows. (legal under building code as long as the room has a sprinkler).

Fun fact: Canada has communities so remote that food has to be flown in 120 million pounds of food gets delivered annually. No mention of electrifying this process.

 

[Stout]

Old man worth $25million complains about people richer than him and tells us we're all going to die because nobody cares.

https://www.ipolitics.ca/2025/07/02/its-too-late-david-suzuki-says-the-fight-against-climate-change-is-lost/

 

[dann]

Impressive numbers on the surface however once you factor in the rate in decrease of emissions, that impressiveness dissipates like the tailpipe emissions from a Ford F-150. Except for Denmark. Hats off to Denmark for getting it done. Still have to cut those emissions in half though, in the next five years and now that coal is over, there's not a lot of cuts left to be made without kerbstomping the western lifestyle. Oh, let's factor in emissions from all the foreign manufacturing and shipping needed to maintain that lifestyle, just for fun, like the inclusion of Palau's carbon footprint.

Because an extreme outlier, a country with a population of 17,759, is terribly important to factor in when Stout is trying to make the numbers of the USA, Canada and Australia look good:

"CO2 emissions per capita in Palau are equivalent to 76.41 tons per person (based on a population of 17,759 in 2022)"
Countries like the USA, Canada and Australia are much more relevant in this context.

Yep, the big countries are pretty much screwed and they're certainly not going to shine or EV their way to 2.3T. Why, you ask? Here's an example. They're just finishing off a brand new eco friendly building down the street and the love to complain about climate change types are complaining about...wait for it...the units in the building not being large enough and some of the bedrooms not having windows. (legal under building code as long as the room has a sprinkler).

Why leave out the American, Canadian and Australian numbers? Why include only European numbers in the post?
And why replace American, Canadian and Australian numbers with an anecdote about ... wait for it ... new apartments being too small and without windows in the bedrooms? Yes, "climate types" should all go in for restricting the size of apartments for ordinary people and making it impossible for them to open a window in their bedrooms to get some light and air. At least, they should, according to Stout.

Fun fact: Canada has communities so remote that food has to be flown in 120 million pounds of food gets delivered annually. No mention of electrifying this process.

Fun fact, Canada emits four times more CO₂ per capita than the Nordic country of Sweden!

Tons per capita:
USA 14.21
Canada 14.99
Australia 15.01
Other countries are doing much, much better and are on their way to 2.3:
UK 5
Italy 5.42
France 4.76
Spain 5.32
Sweden 3.61
Switzerland 4.11
Denmark 4.94

Another fun fact, Canada doesn't want Canadians to replace their gas guzzlers with cheap electric vehicles because that's not how you make deals with American presidents - Democrats or Republicans:

Opinion: Keeping Chinese EVs out key to U.S. deal (Financial Post, July 8, 2025)
Canada imposed a 100% tariff on Chinese EVs when Joe Biden was president. We should tell Donald Trump we're going to keep it.
The deadline for Canada and the U.S. to negotiate a new economic and security relationship is rapidly approaching. Aligning Canada’s approach to Chinese electric vehicles (EVs) with that of the U.S. is key to unlocking a deal.

 

[Stout]

Because an extreme outlier, a country with a population of 17,759, is terribly important to factor in when Stout is trying to make the numbers of the USA, Canada and Australia look good:

You didn't think that was funny? I thought it was hilarious given the Palau Pledge.

Climate types begged for government action and the government responded by making buildings more efficient. The problem is what exactly? Oh not THAT efficient. Living in a frozen wasteland, you have to know all about heat loss from buildings, right?

Yes, the 100% tax on Chinese EVs is retarded. They could be making these things in Canada for the same price but you know, the standard of living for the workers and all that progressive stuff gets in the way.

 

[dann]

Old man worth $25million complains about people richer than him and tells us we're all going to die because nobody cares.

https://www.ipolitics.ca/2025/07/02/its-too-late-david-suzuki-says-the-fight-against-climate-change-is-lost/

Yes, how dare 89-year-old millionaire and "longtime activist to reverse global climate change" David Suzuki criticize the current libertarian climate policies of Canada?!

‘It’s too late’: David Suzuki says the fight against climate change is lost (iPolitics, July 2, 2025)
I absolutely disagree with Carney that the economy and market forces need to be used because the economy itself is driving us into the ditch. It’s based on the creed of cancer — steady growth — and you can’t have endless growth in a finite world. The global economy is far too big, it’s got to shrink, and it’s got to be distributed more equitably around the world.
It’s crazy that we celebrate people who are billionaires. It should be illegal for Christ’s sake. It’s got nothing to do with money, and everything to do with how big their dick is. We should have awards and whenever someone achieves $100 million, which is already obscene, we give them a bronze statue of a dick, and when you get $1 billion, we could give them an even bigger dick.

Suzuki should read up on capitalist economics and how exactly capitalism drives CO₂ emissions, but he is not far off the mark.

 

[dann]

You didn't think that was funny? I thought it was hilarious given the Palau Pledge.

Climate types begged for government action and the government responded by making buildings more efficient. The problem is what exactly? Oh not THAT efficient. Living in a frozen wasteland, you have to know all about heat loss from buildings, right?

Where I live is not at all a "frozen wasteland." It's currently pretty hot, and getting hotter year by year.

For some reason, Stout has me confused with the austerity "climate types" who want to make the struggle against climate change as unpleasant as it is made out to be in MAGA's bedtime stories: 'They are coming to take away your STOVE'!
It's obvious to Stout that in capitalism, windows in bedrooms are a luxury that shouldn't be available to ordinary people!

Yes, the 100% tax on Chinese EVs is retarded. They could be making these things in Canada for the same price but you know, the standard of living for the workers and all that progressive stuff gets in the way.

Stout is trying to make it seem as if the reason why Canada can't manufacture cheap electric cars is the allegedly high "standard of living for the workers" - as if capitalism is all about making workers rich and not their employers, and as if CO₂ emission only exists because Canada's employers and governments are focused on nothing but the best interests of workers, like:
'What do you want, Canadians? Do you want comfortable lives, or do you want a planet that's fit for human habitation? Because you have to make a choice! You can't have both! That's not how capitalism works!'

ETA:

graeme on X, July 4, 2025
love to stand up for the national interest by strategizing with the CEOs of patriotic canadian vehicle manufacturers such as [checks notes] ford, gm, stellantis,

In a reply to:

Mark Carney on X, July 2, 2025
Thanks to the leadership of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers’ Association and its member CEOs for the important meeting today.
As we negotiate with the United States, our focus is clear: getting the best deal for Canadian workers and industries.
In parallel, we’re supporting workers, diversifying our trading partners, and growing our industries here at home through a made-in-Canada supply chain. The @cvma_ca’s partnership is critical to that work.

In another reply to Carney:

BioEternalDamnation Pawcio on X, July 2, 2025
That you ?

 

[Stout]

Yes, how dare 89-year-old millionaire and "longtime activist to reverse global climate change" David Suzuki criticize the current libertarian climate policies of Canada?!

Suzuki should read up on capitalist economics and how exactly capitalism drives CO₂ emissions, but he is not far off the mark.

In the interests of financial equity, I'll gladly relive Suzuki of his money by taking half of it. Put up or shut up...rich guy. Oh but wait, his fortune is "OK" it's only the people with +100 million that are the problem. His activism failed, deep down, nobody wanted it. Energy efficient buildings are great, just that nobody wants to live in them, apparently. Now they're resisting the pod, soon they'll be resisting the bugs and the revolution Suzuki is talking about might just go contra to his ideals.

 

[Stout]

'What do you want, Canadians? Do you want comfortable lives, or do you want a planet that's fit for human habitation? Because you have to make a choice! You can't have both! That's not how capitalism works!'

Overwhelmingly the choice has been for a comfortable life. Sure, some may fantasize about the eco-commie paradise by watching 2040 every day but that lure of hauling the wakeboard boat out to the lake for an afternoon of making memories is mighty strong.

Electric wakeboard boat $300K USD

 

[dann]

In the interests of financial equity, I'll gladly relive Suzuki of his money by taking half of it. Put up or shut up...rich guy. Oh but wait, his fortune is "OK" it's only the people with +100 million that are the problem. His activism failed, deep down, nobody wanted it. Energy efficient buildings are great, just that nobody wants to live in them, apparently. Now they're resisting the pod, soon they'll be resisting the bugs and the revolution Suzuki is talking about might just go contra to his ideals.

That people don't want to live in cramped apartments with windowless bedrooms must mean that they don't support the struggle against global warming. And since Myriad loves nothing more than austerity, he will probably agree with Stout on this one.

 

[dann]

Overwhelmingly the choice has been for a comfortable life. Sure, some may fantasize about the eco-commie paradise by watching 2040 every day but that lure of hauling the wakeboard boat out to the lake for an afternoon of making memories is mighty strong.
Electric wakeboard boat $300K USD

Fossil-fuel fans always portray living comfortably as being incompatible with lowering CO₂ emissions:
'Look at those climate types who don't want to live in crammed, windowless apartments! Hypocrites!'
It's the best way to take focus away from the fact that power can be produced without fossil fuels by using solar panels and wind turbines and that the transition is already taking place and is not an imaginary Utopia or "eco-commie paradise."
Canada is pretty ◊◊◊◊◊◊ in this respect and apparently getting worse.

 

[Stout]

If I was living in a place without a bedroom window, I'd simply leave the door open. I may even buy a fan to circulate out the farts.

It's not so much "hypocrites" and it is...pussies.

So Denmark....cut those emissions in half, chop chop. Don't forget your share of international manufacturing, shipping and air travel. Better yet, go full eco-commie and get it down to 1T/cap to make up for those historical emissions and don't forget to kick in to the massive climate reparations fund.

Paradise awaits.

 

[dann]

Yes, Stout is also in line with the austerity fans on this one, which is funny considering that the rest of the time he is usually claiming that his imaginary 'eco-commies' are the ones who want to force people to give up on things they don't want to give up.

Staying for three days in a hotel room without windows was more than enough for me. Like most people, I just happen to like windows in my bedroom. The hotel room didn't kill me. I just found it annoying, which makes a self-deluded macho like Stout come up with the favourite slur of toxic masculinity. And he opened the door (nobody else would think of that) and bought a fan. The latter doesn't exactly save energy, so it would be a fairly stupid way of compensating for the lack of a window in the bedroom if the idea was to conserve energy, but nobody expected consistency from fans of fossil fuels.

Unlike both Stout and Myriad, I am not only not a fan of austerity, I also know - and have pointed it out several times in this and the other climate thread - that saving energy, for instance by getting rid of windows in apartment buildings, is not necessary and isn't even the point of global warming. The point is the energy that's used to generate the electricity for heating and/or cooling housing and apartments.

Stout and Myriad are never going to acknowledge this, but when the electricity that's used to heat and/or cool living space is generated by means of solar panels and/or wind turbines, the production and consumption of that electricity doesn't emit CO₂.

As for "Denmark....cut those emissions in half, chop chop," that has already happened. As a goal, it's not ambitious enough.
https://www.google.com/search?clien...=2ahUKEwj_3JLlv7SOAxWcKBAIHZDuIlUQth96BAg4EAQ