4C of warming would probably cause a collapse in the ability to feed the populace, and render large chunks of the world uninhabitable without active cooling, or because they'll be underwater.
It's hard to imagine how civilization survives this, without those regions that do continue to have arable land putting up walls and turrets and mowing down the streams of starving migrants.
At what point do you look at preppers and think "honestly they might be on to something?"
"Indeed, the consequences of a 4C warmer world are so terrifying that most scientists would rather not contemplate them, let alone work out a survival strategy.
Rockström doesn’t like our chances. “It’s difficult to see how we could accommodate a billion people or even half of that,” he says. “There will be a rich minority of people who survive with modern lifestyles, no doubt, but it will be a turbulent, conflict-ridden world.” "
"Since 2005, total global greenhouse-gas emissions have most closely tracked the RCP 8.5 scenario, "
What many seem to forget is 2C or 4C of warming is not an end equilibrium state, it's merely an arbitrary date of measurement (end of 21st century) for the track we may irreparably lock in for centuries and millennia. One a tipping point tips it's damn near impossible to tip it back.
That seems more than a little cavalier given the limited range of regions we find our planet's landmass in. The future looks more and more terrifying, and despite public opinion supporting action in much the world, still the political class have little to no answer anywhere...
We need to SERIOUSLY start considering geo-engineering and artificial methods of cooling the planet. Most people laughed when Andrew Yang brought up space mirrors, but seriously, this is a WAY better option than mowing down streams of migrants. We need to cool this planet with technological solutions, as well as with MASSIVE carbon sequestration by farmers. It's clear our energy transition is going FAR too slowly, so we have to work on the other side of the coin if we have any chance of keep civilization alive.
Can you source these predictions? The timetable matters, for example. If a transition in sea level takes place over a hundred years, it seems reasonable that populations would gradually move uphill.
Also, as land becomes less farmable, other land at higher latitude and elevations might become more so. There's also the increase in vegetation associated with higher CO2 levels that might actually improve some farming.
I don't feel like we should fall into to emotional trap of throwing up our hands and predicting the apocolypse.
The scientific consensus view of the 4C scenario is not a “collapse in the ability to feed the populace.” In fact world population doubles by 2100 in the RCP 8.5 scenario, while world GDP more than triple: https://www.e-education.psu.edu/meteo469/node/145
This is why I choose not to have children, because I have a hard time seeing that people (the majority) will start paying mind to it. I think most people choose (probably on a sub-conscious level) to not be bothered by it, because doing something about it would mean giving up on many things we (citizens of rich countries) take for granted.
I doubt food productions will be a issue. The problems I foresee is transporting food to people and the willingness of the rich to give to the poor.
Aquaculture and particularly aquatic plants and algae are such as small part of the global diet that statistically it might not even exist, and yet civilization could almost exclusive survive on it if needed. We have the know how to make such food edible. Oceans like the Baltic sea is basically in a death spiral because too much eutrophication. The nutrients is there, the farming technique is available, but the culture and economics are not. Similar to how people don't want bread made with grinned down insects, which is also a food production efficiency concept, algae is something that we could produce but won't because people will not buy the products. Even when giving away food we tend to use food that we culturally would also eat.
Right now in local context, this kind of culture crash can result in edible food having a value that is below transport costs. In lakes that suffer from overpopulation you sometimes do a push where you extract hundred of tons of fish in order to restore health to the ecosystem. As I hear, that fish usually get turned into methane and burned as bio fuel.
Food production all over the world is mostly the result of culture and tradition. With global trading we can add a bit more nuances, but even here we can find plenty of example where something which people eat in one place get thrown on the garbage heap in places which don't share the same food culture.
The problem with environmental scientists is that they fail to recognize just how much people and organisms will adapt to situations.
Sure, maybe some organisms will die out, but new exciting ones will appear to replace them. Humans will be able to start farming in Antarctica.
Some people's houses might go underwater but on some inland properties might suddenly become prime beach-front real estate.
Human population might drop, but then house prices will drop too!
The article points out subsidies are one of the main contributors to growth in production of fossil fuels. So forget regulation, just take the government thumb off the scale in favor of fossil fuels.
This is somewhat disingenuous on my part as I am for using the government thumb if necessary to achieve goals that allow society to continue like a clean energy mix. However, maybe this could still be done in a light touch way like massive grants into basic research which I do think the US government has had success with in the past.
Fossil fuel could take part in this as well but from my perspective, they have never been interested in pursuing goals like efficiency and sustainability though innovation. They are driven by finding ways to create more demand for energy use and scaling up existing technology that is good enough for that purpose.
The problem with this is that you suddenly find that all the people who you thought were arguing in good faith about not liking government intervention, were actually only doing that as a tactic to stall specific things they didn't like, not as a general principle.
They'll have a completely new set of disingenuous talking points (unsubsidized fuel would hit the poorest hardest!) ready to confuse people and to stall that action as well.
What they mean by subsidies are externalities they government doesn't tax, not active subsidies. The problem with that thinking is that people aren't remotely in agreement of what the dollar cost of those externalities actually are, so painting them as straight subsidies that can simply be cut off is dishonest.
In addition, the use of untaxed externalities in arguments like this implies they aren't asking to take the government's thumb off, they are asking for the government to use more thumb, except against the companies they don't like.
There will be societal effects. For example if heating fuel subsidy is removed, poor people with big uninsulated houses will be hit worse. So a candidate is unlikely to touch such a subsidy.
Yep. This is the point I've been trying to make to many Americans.
This issue goes beyond our consumption. The entire worlds growth has to be regulated at this point to ensure stability.
That means Western countries need to accept a lower standard of living or find ways to become vastly more efficient so that developing nations can catch up and we can find an equilibrium in regards to standard of living globally.
Honestly, take a look at what’s happening in Australia right now, it’s absolutely astounding how apocalyptic things are looking there.
What’s more amazing is the Australian Government is still in the business of climate emergency denial.
I’m really worried about certain communities and cities making it through the summer down there. It will be California In the same situation again soon.
It's not a perfect solution, but you can make a big dent in this yourself remarkably easily by carbon offsetting all your own emissions right now: https://www.goclimateneutral.org/
Reducing your emissions completely is difficult. As others here have said, there are many emissions you can't practically reduce yourself, from concrete production to necessary transportation. Even where you can't reduce your personal impact though, you can reduce worldwide carbon output by an equivalent amount instead, by offsetting: directly donating to equivalent reductions elsewhere in the world that just need funding.
There's other providers too (e.g. https://offset.earth/), the only trick is to find somewhere that's cheap per-tonne offset (you should be able to do it for around $4 per tonne), with projects that are vetted & certified. Some more details & links to the kind of projects that offsetting funds here: https://www.goclimateneutral.org/our_projects.
How so? Practically by definition you personally can make an almost incomprehensibly minuscule dent. This is not an issue that is going to be solved by personal action.
We need a way to incentivize countries to take action and bring in carbon pricing and the like.
About the only way I can think of would be a new global trade agreement. Something like meet your carbon targets and get free trade with all other members, don't and face 30% tariffs. If you could get say the US and EU on board pretty much all countries would be forced to follow.
That plus say a $100 carbon price might pretty much fix things for the output drops suggested in the article and not hurt the economy much.
The trouble is, this isn't nearly far enough and it's already sounding politically impossible. The carbon targets need to be zero worldwide without exception and the tariffs need to be more like 1000%.
important to remember that our current systems (no pun intended) are hugely wasteful. I forget the exact statistic but losses from the point of generation to your wall socket are something crazy, like 30%-50%. That's not including lunacy like refrigerators that open like cabinets rather than drawers (spilling all the cold air on the floor and filling the box with warm air. Some fridges have heaters in the door. It's true.) or pilot lights (little flames that burn 24/7 just in case you might want to cook at midnight or whatever.)
Efficiency would solve about half of the problem, in re: energy.
While predicting the climate is hard, predicting humans is even harder. The notion that we are inevitably on the way to 4C of warming (or whatever other figure somebody would have you believe) is frankly outright wrong.
We can reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions through profitable enterprise and without lowering quality of life / stopping economic growth / enforcing strict veganism or whatever else extremists propose. In fact, we can do so far ahead of the IPCC SR15 1.5C scenario requirements. How?
Firstly, don't disregard technologies without understanding their merit. Hydrocarbons are a big part of the problem, yes, but please note that natural gas is about 4x cleaner than coal and has actually been the largest contribution to lowering emissions in the energy sector (~75% natural gas reduction on a large chunk of energy consumption is far more significant than the ~95% renewable reduction on a much smaller portion of energy consumption thus far)
Our world relies on these technologies at the moment and a good climate change solution must include not only a smooth transition away from fossil fuels but also an increase in fossil fuel cleanliness.
Now, climate change is primarily driven by net emissions from 6 things:
- Energy
(electricity, fuels, heat etc.)
- Transportation
(cars, planes, boats etc.)
- Industry
(steel, concrete, plastic etc.)
- Commercial
(buildings, appliances, etc.)
- Agriculture
(mostly beef, other meats, etc.)
- Carbon sequestration
(deforestation, other tech)
Here's how we can solve the problem in all of these areas in a mutually beneficial, profitable way:
1. Nuclear fission is currently the cleanest, safest, and most fuel abundant energy source we have. Most people don't know this. It is also only at a very small fraction of its potential in efficiency and relies on the least common nuclear fuel of the 3 naturally occurring isotopes (U235 vs. Th232, U238)
With some relatively small investment in this space, we can both increase the world's total energy supply by several factors in order to accommodate growth in developing nations and decrease energy sector emissions by >99%, over the course of a few decades.
We can also provide enough cheap electricity to help with the other 5 areas:
2. Electric cars are physically more efficient, faster, and simpler than ICE cars. Same concept applies long term to all transport with the exception of orbital rockets (those which operate in a vacuum), and it is entirely possible that we can shift the entire transportation industry to a mix of (a) fully electric transport and (b) carbon-neutral fuels derived from sequestration techniques, all within a few decades.
3. High grade heat allows us to shift the emissions of steel manufacturing from the plant itself to the energy source. New nuclear fission technologies operating >600 degrees Celsius will allow us to shift the steel industry to net-zero emissions. Bill Gates recently also posted some notes about green concrete https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/Buildings-are-good-for-peo...
Also, cross laminated timber offers a new technology that can be made stronger, cheaper, safer, and more psychologically beneficial than steel and concrete in most buildings, including skyscrapers. This and other biological materials science solutions can help shift away from steel, concrete, and plastic production.
4. Same concept from transportation applies here. Electric things are more efficient and will be cheaper long term across the board, and allow us to shift emissions to the energy sector (which is by far the easiest to reduce emissions in)
5. Agriculture is complicated, and feeding 10 billion people will be hard. But there are a lot of great options and innovations here as well. Indoor farming can be made significantly more reliable, productive, and efficient than regular farming if we have good access to electricity and water. Lab-grown meats, cultural shifts to vegetarianism/veganism, and alternative protein sources all offer options to reduce agricultural emissions by >95%.
6. There are many great companies working on sequestration technologies, and several of these not only remove greenhouse gas from the atmosphere but also provide useful byproducts like clean hydrocarbon fuels. YC has recently funded such companies.
The technological shifts I proposed in sections 4 and 5 will allow us (and/or force us) to start fixing our land and replanting healthy forests.
Every single one of these solutions can realistically be widely implemented by the year 2040/2050, and if we really wanted to (although this is not realistic from a societal perspective) we could really get there by 2030. Every single one of these solutions can improve quality of life and support a growing global economy in a profitable way.
I believe we are going to reach net-zero emissions a lot faster than you might expect.
Please, don't fall for the fear mongering. (and obviously, also don't fall for denialism)
Climate change is real, but it is something we can solve, and we don't have to destroy society or adopt a political extreme across the board to do it. I've got hope for humanity, I hope you do too.
For those interested in MUCH more detail (without a paywall), you can find the original UNEP Production Gap Report here - it's 80 pages instead of 5 paragraphs.
[+] [-] CalRobert|6 years ago|reply
4C of warming would probably cause a collapse in the ability to feed the populace, and render large chunks of the world uninhabitable without active cooling, or because they'll be underwater.
It's hard to imagine how civilization survives this, without those regions that do continue to have arable land putting up walls and turrets and mowing down the streams of starving migrants.
At what point do you look at preppers and think "honestly they might be on to something?"
(edit: additions below) Sources abound but https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/may/18/climate-...
"Indeed, the consequences of a 4C warmer world are so terrifying that most scientists would rather not contemplate them, let alone work out a survival strategy.
Rockström doesn’t like our chances. “It’s difficult to see how we could accommodate a billion people or even half of that,” he says. “There will be a rich minority of people who survive with modern lifestyles, no doubt, but it will be a turbulent, conflict-ridden world.” "
"Since 2005, total global greenhouse-gas emissions have most closely tracked the RCP 8.5 scenario, "
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/01/rcp-85-t...
[+] [-] NeedMoreTea|6 years ago|reply
That seems more than a little cavalier given the limited range of regions we find our planet's landmass in. The future looks more and more terrifying, and despite public opinion supporting action in much the world, still the political class have little to no answer anywhere...
[+] [-] WhompingWindows|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] koheripbal|6 years ago|reply
Also, as land becomes less farmable, other land at higher latitude and elevations might become more so. There's also the increase in vegetation associated with higher CO2 levels that might actually improve some farming.
I don't feel like we should fall into to emotional trap of throwing up our hands and predicting the apocolypse.
[+] [-] rayiner|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwaaway8328|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] belorn|6 years ago|reply
Aquaculture and particularly aquatic plants and algae are such as small part of the global diet that statistically it might not even exist, and yet civilization could almost exclusive survive on it if needed. We have the know how to make such food edible. Oceans like the Baltic sea is basically in a death spiral because too much eutrophication. The nutrients is there, the farming technique is available, but the culture and economics are not. Similar to how people don't want bread made with grinned down insects, which is also a food production efficiency concept, algae is something that we could produce but won't because people will not buy the products. Even when giving away food we tend to use food that we culturally would also eat.
Right now in local context, this kind of culture crash can result in edible food having a value that is below transport costs. In lakes that suffer from overpopulation you sometimes do a push where you extract hundred of tons of fish in order to restore health to the ecosystem. As I hear, that fish usually get turned into methane and burned as bio fuel.
Food production all over the world is mostly the result of culture and tradition. With global trading we can add a bit more nuances, but even here we can find plenty of example where something which people eat in one place get thrown on the garbage heap in places which don't share the same food culture.
[+] [-] cryptica|6 years ago|reply
Human population might drop, but then house prices will drop too!
It's not all bad.
[+] [-] markosaric|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] enitihas|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] danzig13|6 years ago|reply
This is somewhat disingenuous on my part as I am for using the government thumb if necessary to achieve goals that allow society to continue like a clean energy mix. However, maybe this could still be done in a light touch way like massive grants into basic research which I do think the US government has had success with in the past.
Fossil fuel could take part in this as well but from my perspective, they have never been interested in pursuing goals like efficiency and sustainability though innovation. They are driven by finding ways to create more demand for energy use and scaling up existing technology that is good enough for that purpose.
[+] [-] ZeroGravitas|6 years ago|reply
They'll have a completely new set of disingenuous talking points (unsubsidized fuel would hit the poorest hardest!) ready to confuse people and to stall that action as well.
[+] [-] tomatotomato37|6 years ago|reply
In addition, the use of untaxed externalities in arguments like this implies they aren't asking to take the government's thumb off, they are asking for the government to use more thumb, except against the companies they don't like.
[+] [-] Gravityloss|6 years ago|reply
Energy policy is related to social policy.
[+] [-] mywacaday|6 years ago|reply
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/20/china-appetite...
[+] [-] JoeSamoa|6 years ago|reply
This issue goes beyond our consumption. The entire worlds growth has to be regulated at this point to ensure stability.
That means Western countries need to accept a lower standard of living or find ways to become vastly more efficient so that developing nations can catch up and we can find an equilibrium in regards to standard of living globally.
[+] [-] bamboozled|6 years ago|reply
I’m really worried about certain communities and cities making it through the summer down there. It will be California In the same situation again soon.
[+] [-] mrfusion|6 years ago|reply
The breakdown of society? Unable to acquire basic goods? Roving gangs of marauders?
[+] [-] pimterry|6 years ago|reply
Reducing your emissions completely is difficult. As others here have said, there are many emissions you can't practically reduce yourself, from concrete production to necessary transportation. Even where you can't reduce your personal impact though, you can reduce worldwide carbon output by an equivalent amount instead, by offsetting: directly donating to equivalent reductions elsewhere in the world that just need funding.
There's other providers too (e.g. https://offset.earth/), the only trick is to find somewhere that's cheap per-tonne offset (you should be able to do it for around $4 per tonne), with projects that are vetted & certified. Some more details & links to the kind of projects that offsetting funds here: https://www.goclimateneutral.org/our_projects.
[+] [-] WhompingWindows|6 years ago|reply
https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/as-more-people-...
[+] [-] 0xffff2|6 years ago|reply
How so? Practically by definition you personally can make an almost incomprehensibly minuscule dent. This is not an issue that is going to be solved by personal action.
[+] [-] adrianN|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gersh|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] koheripbal|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ptah|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thdrdt|6 years ago|reply
Our family uses around 2000kWh electricity per year. This is half of what most people in my country use. And ~16% of the avarage US usage.
Ofcourse there are a lot of reasons for the differences but the biggest reason is being consumption aware.
We don't own an AC, use LED lights everywhere, and always check the power consumption of appliances we buy.
Being aware of your consumptions really helps.
Paving your roof with solar panels will only help the producer of the panels, not your carbon footprint.
[+] [-] tim333|6 years ago|reply
About the only way I can think of would be a new global trade agreement. Something like meet your carbon targets and get free trade with all other members, don't and face 30% tariffs. If you could get say the US and EU on board pretty much all countries would be forced to follow.
That plus say a $100 carbon price might pretty much fix things for the output drops suggested in the article and not hurt the economy much.
[+] [-] 0xffff2|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] carapace|6 years ago|reply
https://spaswell.wordpress.com/2016/11/18/dr-gwynne-dyer-geo...
- - - -
important to remember that our current systems (no pun intended) are hugely wasteful. I forget the exact statistic but losses from the point of generation to your wall socket are something crazy, like 30%-50%. That's not including lunacy like refrigerators that open like cabinets rather than drawers (spilling all the cold air on the floor and filling the box with warm air. Some fridges have heaters in the door. It's true.) or pilot lights (little flames that burn 24/7 just in case you might want to cook at midnight or whatever.)
Efficiency would solve about half of the problem, in re: energy.
[+] [-] johnmorrison|6 years ago|reply
We can reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions through profitable enterprise and without lowering quality of life / stopping economic growth / enforcing strict veganism or whatever else extremists propose. In fact, we can do so far ahead of the IPCC SR15 1.5C scenario requirements. How?
Firstly, don't disregard technologies without understanding their merit. Hydrocarbons are a big part of the problem, yes, but please note that natural gas is about 4x cleaner than coal and has actually been the largest contribution to lowering emissions in the energy sector (~75% natural gas reduction on a large chunk of energy consumption is far more significant than the ~95% renewable reduction on a much smaller portion of energy consumption thus far)
Our world relies on these technologies at the moment and a good climate change solution must include not only a smooth transition away from fossil fuels but also an increase in fossil fuel cleanliness.
Now, climate change is primarily driven by net emissions from 6 things:
- Energy (electricity, fuels, heat etc.)
- Transportation (cars, planes, boats etc.)
- Industry (steel, concrete, plastic etc.)
- Commercial (buildings, appliances, etc.)
- Agriculture (mostly beef, other meats, etc.)
- Carbon sequestration (deforestation, other tech)
Here's how we can solve the problem in all of these areas in a mutually beneficial, profitable way:
1. Nuclear fission is currently the cleanest, safest, and most fuel abundant energy source we have. Most people don't know this. It is also only at a very small fraction of its potential in efficiency and relies on the least common nuclear fuel of the 3 naturally occurring isotopes (U235 vs. Th232, U238)
With some relatively small investment in this space, we can both increase the world's total energy supply by several factors in order to accommodate growth in developing nations and decrease energy sector emissions by >99%, over the course of a few decades.
We can also provide enough cheap electricity to help with the other 5 areas:
2. Electric cars are physically more efficient, faster, and simpler than ICE cars. Same concept applies long term to all transport with the exception of orbital rockets (those which operate in a vacuum), and it is entirely possible that we can shift the entire transportation industry to a mix of (a) fully electric transport and (b) carbon-neutral fuels derived from sequestration techniques, all within a few decades.
3. High grade heat allows us to shift the emissions of steel manufacturing from the plant itself to the energy source. New nuclear fission technologies operating >600 degrees Celsius will allow us to shift the steel industry to net-zero emissions. Bill Gates recently also posted some notes about green concrete https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/Buildings-are-good-for-peo...
Also, cross laminated timber offers a new technology that can be made stronger, cheaper, safer, and more psychologically beneficial than steel and concrete in most buildings, including skyscrapers. This and other biological materials science solutions can help shift away from steel, concrete, and plastic production.
4. Same concept from transportation applies here. Electric things are more efficient and will be cheaper long term across the board, and allow us to shift emissions to the energy sector (which is by far the easiest to reduce emissions in)
5. Agriculture is complicated, and feeding 10 billion people will be hard. But there are a lot of great options and innovations here as well. Indoor farming can be made significantly more reliable, productive, and efficient than regular farming if we have good access to electricity and water. Lab-grown meats, cultural shifts to vegetarianism/veganism, and alternative protein sources all offer options to reduce agricultural emissions by >95%.
6. There are many great companies working on sequestration technologies, and several of these not only remove greenhouse gas from the atmosphere but also provide useful byproducts like clean hydrocarbon fuels. YC has recently funded such companies.
The technological shifts I proposed in sections 4 and 5 will allow us (and/or force us) to start fixing our land and replanting healthy forests.
Every single one of these solutions can realistically be widely implemented by the year 2040/2050, and if we really wanted to (although this is not realistic from a societal perspective) we could really get there by 2030. Every single one of these solutions can improve quality of life and support a growing global economy in a profitable way.
I believe we are going to reach net-zero emissions a lot faster than you might expect.
Please, don't fall for the fear mongering. (and obviously, also don't fall for denialism)
Climate change is real, but it is something we can solve, and we don't have to destroy society or adopt a political extreme across the board to do it. I've got hope for humanity, I hope you do too.
[+] [-] Gys|6 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] austinwm|6 years ago|reply
https://www.unenvironment.org/resources/report/production-ga...
[+] [-] cgidriver|6 years ago|reply
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