First of all: emissions are not the target. Climate change is the target. Even if all human related greenhouse gas emissions ceased tomorrow we would still be facing catastrophic climate change and then an effectively indefinite period (on a human scale) before things settled down again. We cannot not-pollute our way out of this mess.

Let me reiterate: We can no longer change the outcome by reducing carbon dioxide emissions, and consumer car usage is a small slice of overall carbon dioxide emissions. Of course, we could make it worse. So how much do consumer cars contribute to making it worse?

I don't know if your figure of billions of tons is worldwide or not, the worldwide number i found here is about 3 billion metric tons. (It dropped for 2020! Yay we did it!) In contrast, Wikipedia (who I believe are taking their numbers from the IPCC) lists about 35 billion tons (about 32 billion metric tons) of co2 from fossil fuel burning, with total greenhouse gas emissions of about 50 billion tons (about 45 billion metric).

Then there's also reduction in the Earth's ability to extract co2 due to land use (chopping down forests). This is difficult to model because it's not a direct emission but it is undeniably a result of human activity that unbalances the Earth's climate. That Wikipedia article earlier says that total emissions from 1870 to 2017 were about 1.5 trillion tons from fossil fuels and 660 billion tons from land use change which works out to be about 31% of the total. Note that this is total and cumulative so again: Ceasing all emissions would not change this number. No longer cutting down forests (etc) would not change this number a single gram.

Then there are other factors that are making climate change worse but they're not that important in comparison. I'm going to ignore them because i am not a scientist and i'm not writing a scientific paper here.

I am going to be harsh, however. If you take that 3 billion number and you divide it into the 32 billion number you get about 10%, as you say.

That's not correct if you want to make a difference for climate change.

If you take that 3 billion number and you divide it into the 1.5 trillion tons number you get about 0.2%.

So to answer the question above: how much worse do consumer cars make climate change? Well, they worsen the situation with carbon dioxide by about 0.2% per year, coming from about 10% of our overall emissions, and carbon dioxide is only one of the factors contributing to climate change. So overall? Not much.

And yeah I already know the next argument “bUt YoUr JuSt UsInG fOsSiL fUeLs To ChArGe It”...

That is not my argument.

...except you’re not necessarily, in my area (part of CA), you can choose to have 100% of your electricity provided by renewable sources for a small monthly premium ($18/month).

Oh my god, of course you couldn't help it. The smug liberal (derogatory) virtue signalling had to come out. Jesus fucking Christ.

You understand, right, that if you pay $18 and go from a 50/50 split of fossil fuel and renewable energy (about where CA is) and your neighbor does not what ends up happening is you go 0% fossil fuel and your neighbor goes to 100% fossil fuel and nothing changes, right?

Like, you're paying $18 not to change anything, you're paying $18 so you can go on the internet and complain about how everyone else isn't fixing climate change like you are.

The corporate response to climate change has been to try to convince everyone to take shorter showers, switch to an electric car, and install solar panels. That is, for individual people to do things (that don't matter) and for corporations to continue doing things (that do matter, negatively). You unironically listed two of the three elements of a fucking climate change denial meme.

Also current renewable energy isn't actually that great. I guess this is the right time for my pitch for nuclear power.

If you want to actually have an impact (in the "stop making things worse" direction not the "fix climate change" direction) then let me suggest nuclear power. Nuclear power is great. It's a proven technology. Even nuclear power at its worst is still better than coal, even if you ignore the greenhouse gas emissions difference. I'd argue nuclear power is better than modern renewables too but this post is long enough so i won't.

Right now, coal fired power plants account for 20% of fossil fuel emissions and are the single largest source of emissions. and... well... let me direct quote:

Notably, just 5% of the world's power plants account for almost three-quarters of carbon emissions from electricity generation, based on an inventory of more than 29,000 fossil-fuel power plants across 221 countries.

Putting it a different way, almost 15% of all fossil fuel emissions come from 5% of the world's power plants.

So it's great that California is doing better than average, but if you want to make a difference in emissions you don't try to change every single car on the planet over to electric, which is a tremendous task to undertake. You kill that 5% of power plants and replace them with nuclear. (Or okay if it really makes you feel better i'd be on board with renewables too but nuclear is still the better and more practical solution.)

There are a lot of steps to solving climate change beyond “buy an electric car”, and you’re right that industrial and commercial pollution accounts for the majority, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be pushing on all fronts.

If you want to make a difference right now, probably the best thing you can possibly do is advocate against coal power plants. It's both easier to do than replacing all cars and it would have a bigger impact.

In 2035, 12 years from now, Europe plans to mandate all new cars to be electric. Europe is not responsible for the majority of passenger vehicle emissions. Most countries do not have plans that are anywhere near as ambitious. The US is only aiming at 50%, and that 50% of vehicles that get switched over won't be the ones emitting the most greenhouse gases. (Hybrids being switched to full electrics have little impact when Ford F150s are the most popular vehicle in America.)

Meanwhile, that 5% of power plants is still out there. Industrial and agricultural emissions are still out there. Land use changes are still out there. The vast majority of everything that brought us to this point is still out there, untouched. And when will you get your 100% electric cars worldwide? In 2045? 2060? How deep underwater will Miami and New York City be by the time that happens? How many people will die in the meantime? How much further will the ecosystems of the world be destabilized?

This isn't about "pushing on all fronts". This is about moralizing at individual people about their personal decisions, which did not cause this problem and cannot fix it. Paying $18 to California power companies isn't about improving the world it's about making you, personally, feel better. Like you've "done your part". Meanwhile, the planet is burning. In the coming years, it will burn more and more.

Capitalism wants to pretend that everyone acting individually can solve problems but capitalism created this problem and it cannot and will not solve it.

[–] bitsplease@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So what do you suggest that can actually be done, besides removed about it on Lemmy?

You talk a lot about moralizing without actually making a difference, but that's exactly what you're doing in your comment.

So hit us with it - what should we be doing instead? Other than removed about it on Lemmy, I mean?

[–] winterayars@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago

So what do you suggest that can actually be done, besides removed about it on Lemmy?

I somehow fucking knew this was coming, Everyone has the same response regardless of what you say.

I suggested targeting the most heavily polluting power plants for conversion to clean energy. This suggestion is:

Practical from a cost standpoint
Could be accomplished with current technology
Easier to implement politically than "make all cars electric"
Would have a bigger impact on the environment than "make all cars electric".

You: "Well if you don't have any ideas..."

I know my comment was long but you aren't really arguing with me, you're arguing with the shadows that live inside your head. This was true of your previous post, too. See:

And yeah I already know the next argument “bUt YoUr JuSt UsInG fOsSiL fUeLs To ChArGe It”…

(Which is still not and never has been my argument.)

For the record it's my belief that we could currently not only halt but fully reverse climate change (though it would take maybe 100 years) at our current technological level. I believe it's possible. However, i do not know of any way to do it that does not require major change to the political and economic systems of the West (the ones that brought us to this point, in other words: Capitalism). Back in the '70s it would have been way easier to address this but now we're on hard mode.

You talk a lot about moralizing without actually making a difference, but that’s exactly what you’re doing in your comment.

I'm critiquing a moralizing argument, it's somewhat inevitable that my critique will also adopt the form of a moral argument. Unless you want me to argue that all morals, all ideas of "good" and "bad", are phantasms that are propagated by the powerful as a form of social control or something. Which i also could do, but it seems a little abstract given the current conversation.

Even granting you that point there's still a difference:

My arguments are concerned about outcomes, about material conditions in people's lives, they include the concept of collective and corporate action.

Your arguments are superficial, concerned about appearances, do not acknowledge the context or history of how we came to where we are, and are primarily concerned with individual actions that wealthy Westerners can take without regard to the practicality of implementation across the rest of the world.

I'm going to throw out one more thing:

Even if cars were the biggest source of carbon dioxide, going to all electric cars is not the best solution. Building electric cars still has a significant environmental impact, including greenhouse gas emissions. Better still would be mass transit. Trains and buses are more environmentally friendly still and would allow us to make other changes to society that would further reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Of course, that option is not favored by our capitalist overlords...