Climate change and human responsibility

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

So much nonsense. You talk as if people don't have many opportunities in their daily lives to make better decisions. I look around and see the roads filled with inefficient SUV's and pickups, when they used to be in sedans and hatchbacks while living in massive inefficient 3 story vinyl palaces on the edges of the city and can recognize immediately that you are immensely wrong.

You do realize that the only people buying $110k gas guzzling SUVs and living in their mansions are the top 1%, right?

So much nonsense that you completely missed the point.

[TheIronMaiden]

Originally Posted by Azure

You do realize that the only people buying $110k gas guzzling SUVs and living in their mansions are the top 1%, right?

So much nonsense that you completely missed the point.

Top 1 present in the world but easily 10% of Calgarians.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Azure

You do realize that the only people buying $110k gas guzzling SUVs and living in their mansions are the top 1%, right?

So much nonsense that you completely missed the point.

Really? Really? What reality do you inhabit?

[Red Slinger]

Originally Posted by Azure

You do realize that the only people buying $110k gas guzzling SUVs and living in their mansions are the top 1%, right?

So much nonsense that you completely missed the point.

Top Selling vehicles in Canada:

1- Ford F-Series truck.
2- Ram (#2 both literally and figuratively)
4- Silverado
5- Sierra

The rest of the list is mostly SUV's. So, I think it's fair to say that not only the rich are buying gas-guzzling vehicles. It's most Canadians. It's also most Canadians that live in homes that are far bigger and less energy efficient than required.

Canada has used it's vast resources to develop our wealth and in the process burned an excessive amount of carbon. Same with most other developed nations. It's negligent to then turn around and tell developing nations that they can't do what we did, and that they need to clean up their act, but we won't participate because we're already rich from our resource development. How about we take a little responsibility for our actions?

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Red Slinger

Top Selling vehicles in Canada:

1- Ford F-Series truck.
2- Ram (#2 both literally and figuratively)
4- Silverado
5- Sierra

The rest of the list is mostly SUV's. So, I think it's fair to say that not only the rich are buying gas-guzzling vehicles. It's most Canadians. It's also most Canadians that live in homes that are far bigger and less energy efficient than required.

Canada has used it's vast resources to develop our wealth and in the process burned an excessive amount of carbon. Same with most other developed nations. It's negligent to then turn around and tell developing nations that they can't do what we did, and that they need to clean up their act, but we won't participate because we're already rich from our resource development. How about we take a little responsibility for our actions?

It's tough to take responsibility when you are constantly playing victim.

[Doctorfever]

Originally Posted by Red Slinger

Top Selling vehicles in Canada:

1- Ford F-Series truck.
2- Ram (#2 both literally and figuratively)
4- Silverado
5- Sierra

The rest of the list is mostly SUV's. So, I think it's fair to say that not only the rich are buying gas-guzzling vehicles. It's most Canadians. It's also most Canadians that live in homes that are far bigger and less energy efficient than required.

Canada has used it's vast resources to develop our wealth and in the process burned an excessive amount of carbon. Same with most other developed nations. It's negligent to then turn around and tell developing nations that they can't do what we did, and that they need to clean up their act, but we won't participate because we're already rich from our resource development. How about we take a little responsibility for our actions?

While I don’t disagree with the majority or your post, does the top selling vehicles include corporations, city vehicles, road maintenance, etc? Because that isn’t going to change (overnight). It’s really people’s personal vehicles we should be focusing on.

[Fuzz]

Sure, but the eye test on the road can give you assurance it is generally correct.

[Doctorfever]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Sure, but the eye test on the road can give you assurance it is generally correct.

Sure. But lots of those trucks on the roads are not personal vehicles.

[Red Slinger]

Originally Posted by Doctorfever

Sure. But lots of those trucks on the roads are not personal vehicles.

I don't have those stats. But there are also a lot of taxis, ubers, rentals and other commercial vehicles that are sedans, coupes or even hybrids or electric.

From a completely anecdotal standpoint up until recently I lived in Scenic Acres in NW Calgary. Almost everyone in my neighborhood, most of whom would commute daily to work, owned a pick-up truck. Everyone else, had a large SUV. Some had both. The only exceptions were one guy who had a Subaru Imprezza and another that had a Cadillac (which I had to help shovel out once because it's rear-wheel drive). All of the homes were large with large plots including lawns that required a lot of care. All of them could be making different choices and their quality of life would not suffer at all. I recently moved into a four-plex 5 minutes from my work with no lawn and I purchased a hybrid. I can honestly say that not only has my quality of life not suffered, it's improved.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by Red Slinger

Top Selling vehicles in Canada:

1- Ford F-Series truck.
2- Ram (#2 both literally and figuratively)
4- Silverado
5- Sierra

The rest of the list is mostly SUV's. So, I think it's fair to say that not only the rich are buying gas-guzzling vehicles. It's most Canadians. It's also most Canadians that live in homes that are far bigger and less energy efficient than required.

Canada has used it's vast resources to develop our wealth and in the process burned an excessive amount of carbon. Same with most other developed nations. It's negligent to then turn around and tell developing nations that they can't do what we did, and that they need to clean up their act, but we won't participate because we're already rich from our resource development. How about we take a little responsibility for our actions?

I'm really surprised that luxury taxes haven't been applied to all full size pickup trucks purchased for personal use. We have an issue in north america where people are addicted to large, inefficient vehicles that needs to be curbed.

[Monahammer]

pickup truck culture is outrageously stupid. It actually makes me angry.

[Fuzz]

It doesn't' help that fuel economy standards encourage larger vehicles and make smaller ones much harder to meet the standards. So car companies switched to bigger ones. it's a pretty big fail.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Red Slinger

Top Selling vehicles in Canada:

1- Ford F-Series truck.
2- Ram (#2 both literally and figuratively)
4- Silverado
5- Sierra

The rest of the list is mostly SUV's. So, I think it's fair to say that not only the rich are buying gas-guzzling vehicles. It's most Canadians. It's also most Canadians that live in homes that are far bigger and less energy efficient than required.

Canada has used it's vast resources to develop our wealth and in the process burned an excessive amount of carbon. Same with most other developed nations. It's negligent to then turn around and tell developing nations that they can't do what we did, and that they need to clean up their act, but we won't participate because we're already rich from our resource development. How about we take a little responsibility for our actions?

Trucks are not $110k vehicles. We were specifically talking about SUVs, something most people consider a luxury vehicle.

I personally don't get the point of a truck either if you don't need it, but raging on truck owners without understanding context is hilariously pathetic.

And also completely ignores the problem.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

I'm really surprised that luxury taxes haven't been applied to all full size pickup trucks purchased for personal use. We have an issue in north america where people are addicted to large, inefficient vehicles that needs to be curbed.

lol.

TAX, TAX, TAX.

Why not develop better public transit? Something that is actually proven to make a difference, and is the most likely way to reduce overall driving by everyone.

Every vehicle on the road releases an average of one pound of CO2 per mile driven. Compared with driving alone, taking public transportation reduces CO2 emissions by 45%, decreasing pollutants in the atmosphere and improving air quality. It's estimated that public transportation in the U.S. saves 37 million metric tons of carbon dioxide annually, and even moderate increases in bicycle use each year could save an estimated 6 to 14 million tons .

https://transportation.ucla.edu/blog...0air%20quality.

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by Azure

The point being that if you want to throw around stupidity like 'oh per capita we are worse than the rest of the world', then its only fair to discuss out of 'per capita', who is actually the problem, and whose actions wouldn't make a difference.

If the middle class of Canada (middle 40% of income deciles) was its own country, their per capita emissions would still be #1 among western nations and top 10 in the world, at about 16t of CO2 emitted per capita per year.

So no, in Canada at least this isn't a problem of just high income earners causing emissions. Relative to the rest of the world, we're almost all high income earners and we produce an inordinate amount of emissions.

[Leondros]

Originally Posted by Azure

You do realize that the only people buying $110k gas guzzling SUVs and living in their mansions are the top 1%, right?

So much nonsense that you completely missed the point.

Lol WTF?

Did you even look at the report?

I have a bunch of issues with it which I will post separately. BUT, from the methodology note:

Top 10% has a bottom threshold income of $44,000 USD per the report... The 1% has a bottom of $500,000.

[Leondros]

Am I reading their methodology correctly?

https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository...pdf?sequence=5

Overview of the Stockholm Environment
Institute’s approach to calculating emissions by
income group
Oxfam and the Stockholm Environment Institute’s (SEI) approach to estimating how global carbon emissions can be attributed to individuals based on their consumption builds on previous work by Oxfam and the SEI. Other researchers, including Lucas Chancel and Thomas Piketty, have made similar findings.

The approach used in this report follows the methodology outlined in Oxfam
and the SEI’s 2020 report The Carbon Inequality Era, with some changes to the data sources.6 For the 2020 report, multiple data sources were relied upon to address data gaps in emissions, income distribution and income data. However, in this analysis, it was found that the preferred datasets now provide better coverage, enabling a streamlined approach and less dependence on multiple sources for most variables.

We start with national consumption emissions data for 196 countries from
1990 to 2019 from the Global Carbon Atlas, which covers nearly 99% of global emissions. This reflects both the carbon emissions produced in a country and those the net emissions embedded in import trade while excluding those embedded in exports. Emissions measured are for carbon dioxide (CO2) and exclude non-CO2 emissions and emissions from land use, land-use change and forestry (LULUCF) due to limited data.

We allocate national consumption emissions to individuals within each country based on a functional relationship between income and emissions, drawing on the most recent income-distribution data from the World Inequality Database (WID).

Based on numerous studies at national, regional and global levels, we
assume that emissions rise in proportion to income, above a minimum
emissions floor and to a maximum emissions ceiling.These estimates of the
consumption emissions of individuals in each country are then sorted into a
global distribution according to income.

National income data (i.e. gross domestic product(GDP)) is obtained from Penn World Tables (PWT), and gap-filled with data from the World Bank’s World Development Indicators (WDI). The data is expressed in 2017 US dollars (USD) purchasing power parity (PPP), which adjusts for differences in purchasing power between different countries and regions. Population numbers for the SEI estimates are also from PWT and WDI up to 2019.

Lol what? So the a key finding of their report was that most of the carbon emissions are at the top income and that was a key assumption of their allocation of carbon - by income? What?!

[Leondros]

Originally Posted by Leondros

Lol WTF?

Did you even look at the report?

I have a bunch of issues with it which I will post separately. BUT, from the methodology note:

Top 10% has a bottom threshold income of $44,000 USD per the report... The 1% has a bottom of $500,000.

Just to take this one step further:

According to the 2021 Canadian Income Survey (CIS), the average income in 2021 was $53,100, and the median income was $40,500. Among large Canadian cities, Calgary had the highest average income of $60,000, and Montreal had the highest median income of $41,600

So at roughly $60,000 ($44,000 USD), Almost half of the population of Canada is considered in the 10%. Not only that, none of these numbers take into consideration of populations under 18 not earning any money...

[edslunch]

Originally Posted by Azure

You do realize that the only people buying $110k gas guzzling SUVs and living in their mansions are the top 1%, right?

So much nonsense that you completely missed the point.

[Barnes]

Originally Posted by Azure

lol.

TAX, TAX, TAX.

Why not develop better public transit? Something that is actually proven to make a difference, and is the most likely way to reduce overall driving by everyone.



https://transportation.ucla.edu/blog...0air%20quality.

Guys, this is a fantastic idea! Some real innovative solutioneering I can't believe this hasn't been thought of. I am really kicking myself, seems so obvious now.

And, we can fund it through... uh oh. Azure's not going to be happy.