Climate change and human responsibility

[Lubicon]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

Every hour a whole plane is in flight emits approximately 1/4 ton of GHG eq. Even if all 30,000 took private planes I'm not sure you could get to a percentage of that number.

10% of Alberta's yearly emissions is 27,000,000 tons of CO2e
https://www.cer-rec.gc.ca/en/data-an...20per%20capita.

An 8 hour flight creates about 2 tons CO2e

https://www.carbonindependent.org/22.html

There's also an argument that modern aircraft are equally as fuel efficient as vehicles when distance travelled and the number of people transported are considered.

Clearly it would be good to improve both, but air travel doesn't seem to be any less efficient than travelling by car.

https://www.traveller.com.au/how-fue...th-cars-h1gc84

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by Lubicon

There's also an argument that modern aircraft are equally as fuel efficient as vehicles when distance travelled and the number of people transported are considered.



Clearly it would be good to improve both, but air travel doesn't seem to be any less efficient than travelling by car.



https://www.traveller.com.au/how-fue...th-cars-h1gc84

Yeah. And aircraft cost millions and have ROI cycles that require decades, so I don't see any fuel other than synthetic biofuels being able to replace them. And that will drive costs way up, which will naturally drive flying per capita down.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

No. This is forest and trees stuff here.

Personal sacrifice was never the way this is going to happen. It needs policy changes and that needs governments getting together. Aviation is responsible for only 2% of emissions, so cutting these flights is more performative theater than going.

For example concrete is responsible for about 8% of greenhouse emissions. Even if going green doubles the price of concrete, it would only add a few percent on to total construction costs for some buildings. Companies themselves won't choose this route, butt policies could start a shift. Same with steel. Road transport is a bigger emitter than aviation and the switch to electric transport needs massive policy and investment shifts. To make these shifts, corporations need signals from government that this is going to happen and the policy environment is going to require it. If there's no EV incentives, nor fleet emission targets, does GM invest $30B in battery development? No, because they need some certainty it'll be money well spent

On the flip side, the politicking going on in Glasgow when there's an existential crisis is beyond infuriating. But these are politicians, and by definition they need to go where the political winds push them, so here we are. Symbolism matters when needing to push big change because the voters need to push this.

Well I am very familiar with the concrete issue, and one reason it is taking so long to switch out is because governments are slow to approve CLT & other alternatives to concrete as building products.

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by Azure

Well I am very familiar with the concrete issue, and one reason it is taking so long to switch out is because governments are slow to approve CLT & other alternatives to concrete as building products.

Yup. And it's expensive to scale, so not only does it need approvals in building codes in so many jurisdictions, it needs federal policies to put it on the same foot as regular concrete. It's a tough nut to crack without yet another industry disruption with incumbents standing to lose everything. To move these things will inevitably pick winners and losers and that's politically unpalatable. Hence the gridlock

[Azure]

In the terms of CLT, there are approvals in some jurisdictions (BC is great), and others such as Manitoba / Sask there is nothing, and they are very restrictive in terms of adopting new ideas.

Not just CLT, but any pre-fab construction you are basically dragging nails across the chalkboard trying to get planning boards to approve permits if it isn't what they 'think' is the right way of building.

We need better leadership on these issues, but it doesn't seem like anyone at the government level really understands what is going on.

[Torture]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

No. This is forest and trees stuff here.

Personal sacrifice was never the way this is going to happen. It needs policy changes and that needs governments getting together. Aviation is responsible for only 2% of emissions, so cutting these flights is more performative theater than going.

For example concrete is responsible for about 8% of greenhouse emissions. Even if going green doubles the price of concrete, it would only add a few percent on to total construction costs for some buildings. Companies themselves won't choose this route, butt policies could start a shift. Same with steel. Road transport is a bigger emitter than aviation and the switch to electric transport needs massive policy and investment shifts. To make these shifts, corporations need signals from government that this is going to happen and the policy environment is going to require it. If there's no EV incentives, nor fleet emission targets, does GM invest $30B in battery development? No, because they need some certainty it'll be money well spent

On the flip side, the politicking going on in Glasgow when there's an existential crisis is beyond infuriating. But these are politicians, and by definition they need to go where the political winds push them, so here we are. Symbolism matters when needing to push big change because the voters need to push this.

Exactly this. We need large structural change, not a couple small changes at an individual level. Personal carbon footprint is BS propaganda to distract from the real issues.

It’s here that British Petroleum, or BP, first promoted and soon successfully popularized the term “carbon footprint" in the early aughts. The company unveiled its “carbon footprint calculator” in 2004 so one could assess how their normal daily life — going to work, buying food, and (gasp) traveling — is largely responsible for heating the globe. A decade and a half later, “carbon footprint” is everywhere. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has a carbon calculator. The New York Times has a guide on “How to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint.” Mashable published a story in 2019 entitled “How to shrink your carbon footprint when you travel.” Outdoorsy brands love the term.

“This is one of the most successful, deceptive PR campaigns maybe ever,” said Benjamin Franta, who researches law and history of science as a J.D.-Ph.D. student at Stanford Law School.

https://mashable.com/feature/carbon-...-campaign-sham

It’s also worth remembering that the very concept of a personal carbon footprint was popularised by a wide-reaching 2005 BP media campaign. “It was the most brilliant example of ‘It’s your fault, not ours,’” says Westerwelt. “It's a framework that serves them really well because they can just say ‘Oh well, if you really care then why are you driving an SUV?’”
....
But it is crucial to also acknowledge that we are all part of a bigger system that not everyone is equally complicit in holding up. “The we responsible for climate change is a fictional construct, one that’s distorting and dangerous,” writes climate scholar and author Genevieve Guenther. “By hiding who’s really responsible for our current, terrifying predicament, [the pronoun] we provides political cover for the people who are happy to let hundreds of millions of other people die for their own profit and pleasure.”

What Guenther is saying boils down to the question of who holds the power to create and change the systems that cause climate change. If you can only afford a home in an edge-of-town housing estate without access to public transport, is it really your fault for becoming dependent on a car?

“Just because you can allocate [emissions] to an entity or to a location in a supply chain, does not mean that the power of agency lies with that entity or that location in the supply chain,” says Steinberger. “If you’re thinking about these supply chains, are you going to say that final consumers actually have the final decision-making over everything that happens upstream? Who is actually taking the damaging decision?”

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/2...does-it-matter

[zamler]

I am glad to learn I don't have to change a thing in my life because I'm not the problem.

[Azure]

On a personal level you really aren't the problem, and being more environmentally conscious probably has more to do with having a clean local community for you and your kids than it does with keeping global temperature levels from rising.

Driving an electric car is great, but nobody really thinks that one car is going to solve global emissions.

Now if the government had incentives in place where thousands of people were adopting EVs versus ICE vehicles, now we are starting to see some lasting change.

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by zamler

I am glad to learn I don't have to change a thing in my life because I'm not the problem.

Oh come on.

[Lanny_McDonald]

Originally Posted by Azure

Now if the government had incentives in place where thousands of people were adopting EVs versus ICE vehicles, now we are starting to see some lasting change.

Good thing those incentives, both for individuals and manufactures exist.

https://fueleconomy.gov/feg/taxevb.shtml

[calgarygeologist]

Does anyone know what the passenger rail infrastructure is like in Canada? I know out east it is a bit more built out when compared with the prairies and western Canada but is it mostly diesel or electric? Is passenger rail "cleaner" than air travel in Canada?

I ask be our environmental activist Minister of Environment and Climate Change today said that he is looking forward to traveling back from COP and traveling across Canada, by rail, to visit the various provinces to discuss policy. I understand rail travel in Europe but does it make sense for him and his entourage to be traveling across Canada by rail?

[Lubicon]

Originally Posted by calgarygeologist

Does anyone know what the passenger rail infrastructure is like in Canada? I know out east it is a bit more built out when compared with the prairies and western Canada but is it mostly diesel or electric? Is passenger rail "cleaner" than air travel in Canada?

I ask be our environmental activist Minister of Environment and Climate Change today said that he is looking forward to traveling back from COP and traveling across Canada, by rail, to visit the various provinces to discuss policy. I understand rail travel in Europe but does it make sense for him and his entourage to be traveling across Canada by rail?

I think it's entirely diesel. I'm not aware of any electrified rail in Canada other than transit. Even regional transit (GO in Ontario, West Coast Express in Vancouver) is diesel. Montreal may be electrifying some of their regional trains (?), I'm not sure.

[Flames0910]

edit: deleted

[Street Pharmacist]

To the surprise of no one, India and in the background mostly China submarined COP26 deal at the last minute. Forced a change from "phase out coal", to "phase down coal" which removes all clarity.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/cop26-1.6248013

[CaptainCrunch]

What did you expect. It was once again a waste of time, a lot of money, it spewed emissions in excess of a small city for a year in the span of a couple of weeks. But everyone got to rub shoulders with celebrities and have a nice vacation on someone elses dime.

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

To the surprise of no one, India and in the background mostly China submarined COP26 deal at the last minute. Forced a change from "phase out coal", to "phase down coal" which removes all clarity.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/cop26-1.6248013

Perhaps fitting that as COP26 finally ends with a whimper, UK wind generation falls to <1GW and less than coal. Without massive amounts of natural gas, it's no surprise that India and China will choose to maintain energy security with coal.

[CliffFletcher]

Russia is threatening to cut off natural gas to the EU over the Polish border refugee crisis. Great call by the EU winding down domestic natural gas production before substantially reducing natural gas needs.

[Fuzz]

Nothing a few billion solar panels can't fix.

[Street Pharmacist]

So in 2021, BC had:

Driest spring ever recorded in the interior

Hottest summer ever by a lot. Many degrees a lot

Wettest November on record.






Is anyone still convinced it's not real?

[zamler]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

Is anyone still convinced it's not real?

Don't think it matters. Across the spectrum of industry and politics climate change is largely accepted as being incontrovertible. Meaning, there is no excuse for not affecting change.