Climate change and human responsibility

[Mathgod]

This much is for certain... if everyone thinks "I gotta be exempt from making any sacrifices for reasons x, y, and z"... this climate problem is never going to be solved.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by Mathgod

This much is for certain... if everyone thinks "I gotta be exempt from making any sacrifices for reasons x, y, and z"... this climate problem is never going to be solved.

It has to start at the community level with proper city planning. Cities need to be set up in a way that people don't need to choose between having a car or having employment.

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by Mathgod

I wonder how many in the need-a-car-to-get-to-work crowd actually don't have any way to get to work other than driving a vehicle of their own, vs how many of them just really don't want to take transit or carpool.

The speed differential is an overwhelming advantage. Just look at how quickly the car overtook transit after WW2 in the UK. Not only did it replace transit travel, it greatly increased mobility for the average person. With a car, people have more options on where they work, where they live and the services and amenities they can reach.

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

It has to start at the community level with proper city planning. Cities need to be set up in a way that people don't need to choose between having a car or having employment.

Transportation has always been a key consideration. A city where you "don't need" a car can still be a city where the average worker spends 1 or more hours or more on trains and buses commuting from decent homes far from the core, or living in tiny homes nearer work.

[Mathgod]

Originally Posted by accord1999

The speed differential is an overwhelming advantage. Just look at how quickly the car overtook transit after WW2 in the UK. Not only did it replace transit travel, it greatly increased mobility for the average person. With a car, people have more options on where they work, where they live and the services and amenities they can reach.

Which goes back to what I said about sacrifice. We're all going to have to do some of it if there's going to be a habitable planet for future generations to live on. And no, the answer is not to expect cities that have already been built to be rebuilt.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by Mathgod

Which goes back to what I said about sacrifice. We're all going to have to do some of it if there's going to be a habitable planet for future generations to live on. And no, the answer is not to expect cities that have already been built to be rebuilt.

I think they actually do need to be rebuilt.

That doesn't mean a complete tearing down of everything, but a gradually rebuild through zoning and incentives, and then take all the lessons learned for future builds.

I moved away from the Vancouver area for 15 years and then returned a couple of years ago. Over those 15 years, the areas around rural Maple Ridge have basically been turned into residential suburbs with almost no commercial or industrial hubs, and no economical public transit. It is literally impossible for people to live close to where they work. They basically just added to the Vancouver commutershed with no forethought. Fifteen years isn't a long time ago and we knew about all these problems then, yet we purposely made them worse.

I get it, people have to live where they can afford to and the areas around the main centers of employment are unaffordable to the people who work there. This is due to supply and demand, poor legislation allowing landlords to gouge people, foreign buyers and corporations outbidding average Canadians, and bad zoning decisions (much of them recent and ongoing).

There is actually a fair bit of commercial vacancy partly due to COVID, but also due to the dying of 'brick-and-mortar' store and office fronts. It would make so much sense to pursue policies that convert a lot of these areas to residential housing. Instead of allowing investors to buy properties, the municipalities should be buying them and making more affordable public housing.

The people who should sacrifice first are the ones making all the money from these developments and property hoarding while everyone else pays the social and environmental costs.

Trust me, if I never had to drive a car and get into traffic again, I would be very happy. I already walk and catch public transit everywhere I possibly can. It would be the opposite of a sacrifice for me, and I am sure there are millions of people like me. What I won't sacrifice is my job or my child's education, which requires a carbon footprint due to how the system and society is shaped. Make the changes at the top and people will gladly fall in line.

[peter12]

Yeah we can all talk about how convenient the car is and how important it is for your child’s life etc… but the car is making your child’s future incalculably worse so maybe people should factor that into their self interest?

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by peter12

Yeah we can all talk about how convenient the car is and how important it is for your child’s life etc… but the car is making your child’s future incalculably worse so maybe people should factor that into their self interest?

Like how though? They don't have school buses here and there are only so many available rental units within walking distance to her school/before and after care facility.

My employer requires that I work at the office until 5 pm, her after school care has the latest pick-up time at 5:30 pm. It's isn't even theoretically possible to make that work without a car. It's barely possible even with a car.

So what sacrifice should I personally make with this example? She legally has to go to school. I need to work to pay the rent.

If rent was cheaper, I could sacrifice by taking a lower paying job closer to home or rent a place closer to where we need to be, but it's just not possible. Between my wife and I we don't save any money. Every cent we make goes to essentials already, so what is there to sacrifice? When people are just surviving, asking them sacrifice more is a bit of a sore point.

[peter12]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

Like how though? They don't have school buses here and there are only so many available rental units within walking distance to her school/before and after care facility.

My employer requires that I work at the office until 5 pm, her after school care has the latest pick-up time at 5:30 pm. It's isn't even theoretically possible to make that work without a car. It's barely possible even with a car.

So what sacrifice should I personally make with this example? She legally has to go to school. I need to work to pay the rent.

If rent was cheaper, I could sacrifice by taking a lower paying job closer to home or rent a place closer to where we need to be, but it's just not possible. Between my wife and I we don't save any money. Every cent we make goes to essentials already, so what is there to sacrifice? When people are just surviving, asking them sacrifice more is a bit of a sore point.

Oh don't get me wrong - this will require a massive infrastructure undertaking led by government to make life easier for people like you.

[BagoPucks]

I think it's probably a multipronged approach that is needed from the consumers. Do we need such big cars? Do we need such big houses? Do we need so many flights and vacations? Do we need to eat the way we do? Do we need to have so many new things?

What is the simplest, environmentally friendly, comfortable life we can live?
I know for me it is a balance but if we aren't weighing the environmental costs we are never going to get there.

[zamler]

Originally Posted by peter12

Oh don't get me wrong - this will require a massive infrastructure undertaking led by government to make life easier for people like you.

This is very vague, can you give some specifics?

[81MC]

Passenger vehicles account for ~20% of ghg emissions. It’ll take a hell of a lot more than going from a pickup truck to a smart car to make meaningful difference. It requires a total shift in the way we function, but happily a lot of that is stuff that really shouldn’t be much of a stretch for people. Business on the other hand, well the paradigm shift would probably be pretty opposed by then.

Fruit from halfway around the world wrapped in plastic at the supermarket. A new oversees television style every couple of years. Throw away clothing from every third world nation in every shop at the mall. How many of us know someone who’s garage or basement is full of shut that took resources to manufacture and transport that is unused and ultimately going to need some more resources to dispose of?

Buying a new EV is great but the numbers don’t indicate that will do much.

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by BagoPucks

I think it's probably a multipronged approach that is needed from the consumers. Do we need such big cars? Do we need such big houses? Do we need so many flights and vacations? Do we need to eat the way we do? Do we need to have so many new things?

What is the simplest, environmentally friendly, comfortable life we can live?
I know for me it is a balance but if we aren't weighing the environmental costs we are never going to get there.

The most effective way to reduce all of those things is to increase the cost. However, that will mean the affluent will continue to do them while everyone else cuts back. For example, if the cost of flying doubled (bringing it closer in line with the cost before mass budget air travel was born in the 90s), we would see a dramatic reduction in air travel by the middle and working classes, but only moderate reduction by the upper middle class and affluent. Which would foster resentment.

The alternative is rationing (for example, everyone is allowed no more than one flight every two years). But that would require much more heavy-handed intervention by the state.

[PeteMoss]

Originally Posted by 81MC

Passenger vehicles account for ~20% of ghg emissions. It’ll take a hell of a lot more than going from a pickup truck to a smart car to make meaningful difference. It requires a total shift in the way we function, but happily a lot of that is stuff that really shouldn’t be much of a stretch for people. Business on the other hand, well the paradigm shift would probably be pretty opposed by then.

Fruit from halfway around the world wrapped in plastic at the supermarket. A new oversees television style every couple of years. Throw away clothing from every third world nation in every shop at the mall. How many of us know someone who’s garage or basement is full of shut that took resources to manufacture and transport that is unused and ultimately going to need some more resources to dispose of?

Buying a new EV is great but the numbers don’t indicate that will do much.

If I'm reading your post right... Wouldn't it cut 20% of ghg emissions? That seems like a lot.

[PeteMoss]

Originally Posted by accord1999

The speed differential is an overwhelming advantage. Just look at how quickly the car overtook transit after WW2 in the UK. Not only did it replace transit travel, it greatly increased mobility for the average person. With a car, people have more options on where they work, where they live and the services and amenities they can reach.

How much of this is due to the fact thay we spend billions of dollars a year on road improvement and expansions?

[nik-]

Originally Posted by PeteMoss

If I'm reading your post right... Wouldn't it cut 20% of ghg emissions? That seems like a lot.

Power to charge EV's needs to be generated. It's not X% less petrol cars = X% less GHG

[edslunch]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

It has to start at the community level with proper city planning. Cities need to be set up in a way that people don't need to choose between having a car or having employment.

It should have started there. We don’t have time to rebuild our cities in the short term though.

[zamler]

From the EPA



Seems like cutting GHG emissions in half is doable in the next 10 years if we use electricity to power transport.

[Fuzz]

If we are being realistic and honest based on human behaviour, our only hope is technical solutions that bring costs of green replacements down to the cost of their current equivalents. People are willing to pay slightly more, but that's it. I have no doubt we will eventually get there, but is that 10 years out, or 50, or 100? I don't know. But gradual adaptation to climate change is much more likely than massive societal changes.

We've been preaching forced change for decades, with little progress. I just don't see it happening, and our current technology has a ways to go. Many things have no substitute.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by zamler

From the EPA



Seems like cutting GHG emissions in half is doable in the next 10 years if we use electricity to power transport.

How does that make sense? Cutting it in half would remove half the pie, but transport is only 1/4. And then you shift those transport emissions to electricity generation emissions, and how are we any further ahead?