As a father of two small children I feel heartbroken. Will we die together in a heatwave in a few years? Do I flee north now? How should we (can we?) prepare (them) for what is coming. Can the next generation have something close to a "normal" live?
Agreed. Our 9 year old keeps talking about "When I grow up I'm going to be a chef", he's really set on it. Our 5 year old says she wants to be a "girl scientist".
It tears me up inside to think that we might not even have food and water by the time they get there, let alone the level of pretend we have to maintain so that their childhood is preserved now.
I grew up thinking there was a decent chance we would run out of oil and civilization would collapse. EVs were not a thing and I remember reading about how an economical battery big enough to give a car good range was not possible, and that modern civilization in general was impossible without cheap oil. I read detailed articles about how impossible powering modern society without fossil fuels was… articles that are now clearly wrong.
My parents grew up thinking they might die at any moment in a nuclear war.
I’m not saying nothing will happen. Obviously we are already dialed into this and it’s physics and it will have effects. I’m also not saying past successes guarantee future ones.
I’m just saying that every generation since WWII has grown up with at least one impending doom scenario and yet here we are.
“May you live in interesting times.”
Personally I think we will be forced to adapt to climate change, and that it will be expensive and in parts of the world ugly. It will drive migration and conflict. It will rob us of dividends we could have spent on better things but instead must be spent on infrastructure mega projects. It will kill and impoverish and start wars.
But we will make it.
People will say never again, let’s never ignore warnings like that again. But we will probably forget that lesson, unfortunately, and future generations will grow up under some other avoidable doom cloud.
I think the current air pollution deaths of fossil fuels (several millions per year) are roughly an order of magnitude higher than even expected climate change deaths.
Many of the big estimates of death rates in say 2100 combine the air pollution of continuing to use coal and combustion engines with heat and climate effects.
The good news is that we have cheaper, better, cleaner options for the vast majority of that fuel burn today and they continue to get better, cheaper and cleaner. There's a clear shift in the market, it just takes time to work it's way through.
But if your kid has asthma today then that is probably doing more damage to them than climate change.
Of course, to state the obvious, both problems have the same solution. Stop burning fossil fuels.
There are even more reasons to phase out fossil fuels.
They are non-renewable, meaning the more we use them the more we have sunk cost in an energy infrastructure that in the long term can only get more expensive and more scarce. That's the opposite of what you want. It also means there's hard limits to how big they can scale, and the more you scale them the worse their scaling gets. Also the opposite of what you want.
They are geopolitically problematic and bind us to foreign conflicts.
Many of the most virulently anti-American and anti-Western ideologies (like fundamentalist radical Islam) are propped up and funded by petrostates. Domestically a lot of authoritarian far-right ideology (which IMO is also anti-American if you think America should be a free country) is funded by the fossil fuel industry. The term fundamentalism comes from a tract called The Fundamentals published by an oil baron.
I think the best initial effort is to get the corrupt politicians (for example, Gavin Newson received a record $16,700,000 from utility lobbyists this year) to tear down the utility monopolies/duopolies, to make power, and therefore cooling, more stable/cheap.
Solar would make it worse because the religious dogma says we must de-industrialze and do degrowth. Replacing fossil fuels with solar or anything else is like wearing condoms or using PReP instead of abstaining from sex. To the faithful that's worse because it allows the sin to continue. The only approved answer is abstinence.
Logistically (from wikipedia): Elderly people living by themselves had never faced such extreme heat before and did not know how to react or were too mentally or physically impaired by the heat to make the necessary adaptations themselves. Elderly people with family support or those residing in nursing homes were more likely to have others who could make the adjustments for them. This led to unexpected survival rates with the weakest group having fewer deaths than the more physically fit; most of the heat victims came from the group of elderly not requiring constant medical care; often childless women who lived alone.
Comments
As a father of two small children I feel heartbroken. Will we die together in a heatwave in a few years? Do I flee north now? How should we (can we?) prepare (them) for what is coming. Can the next generation have something close to a "normal" live?
Agreed. Our 9 year old keeps talking about "When I grow up I'm going to be a chef", he's really set on it. Our 5 year old says she wants to be a "girl scientist".
It tears me up inside to think that we might not even have food and water by the time they get there, let alone the level of pretend we have to maintain so that their childhood is preserved now.
On current trends in 20 years it should be about 0.33 C warmer which may be noticeable but is unlikely to be a no food or water situation.
I grew up thinking there was a decent chance we would run out of oil and civilization would collapse. EVs were not a thing and I remember reading about how an economical battery big enough to give a car good range was not possible, and that modern civilization in general was impossible without cheap oil. I read detailed articles about how impossible powering modern society without fossil fuels was… articles that are now clearly wrong.
My parents grew up thinking they might die at any moment in a nuclear war.
I’m not saying nothing will happen. Obviously we are already dialed into this and it’s physics and it will have effects. I’m also not saying past successes guarantee future ones.
I’m just saying that every generation since WWII has grown up with at least one impending doom scenario and yet here we are.
“May you live in interesting times.”
Personally I think we will be forced to adapt to climate change, and that it will be expensive and in parts of the world ugly. It will drive migration and conflict. It will rob us of dividends we could have spent on better things but instead must be spent on infrastructure mega projects. It will kill and impoverish and start wars.
But we will make it.
People will say never again, let’s never ignore warnings like that again. But we will probably forget that lesson, unfortunately, and future generations will grow up under some other avoidable doom cloud.
Thank you, that's a really down to earth take on the situation; adds a dash of sense and rationale to my feelings on the topic.
Makes me wonder how many times my parents wondered whether we were going to make it/had to pretend everything was going to be okay.
I think the current air pollution deaths of fossil fuels (several millions per year) are roughly an order of magnitude higher than even expected climate change deaths.
Many of the big estimates of death rates in say 2100 combine the air pollution of continuing to use coal and combustion engines with heat and climate effects.
The good news is that we have cheaper, better, cleaner options for the vast majority of that fuel burn today and they continue to get better, cheaper and cleaner. There's a clear shift in the market, it just takes time to work it's way through.
But if your kid has asthma today then that is probably doing more damage to them than climate change.
Of course, to state the obvious, both problems have the same solution. Stop burning fossil fuels.
There are even more reasons to phase out fossil fuels.
They are non-renewable, meaning the more we use them the more we have sunk cost in an energy infrastructure that in the long term can only get more expensive and more scarce. That's the opposite of what you want. It also means there's hard limits to how big they can scale, and the more you scale them the worse their scaling gets. Also the opposite of what you want.
They are geopolitically problematic and bind us to foreign conflicts.
Many of the most virulently anti-American and anti-Western ideologies (like fundamentalist radical Islam) are propped up and funded by petrostates. Domestically a lot of authoritarian far-right ideology (which IMO is also anti-American if you think America should be a free country) is funded by the fossil fuel industry. The term fundamentalism comes from a tract called The Fundamentals published by an oil baron.
Many, many reasons to phase out fossil fuels.
I think the best initial effort is to get the corrupt politicians (for example, Gavin Newson received a record $16,700,000 from utility lobbyists this year) to tear down the utility monopolies/duopolies, to make power, and therefore cooling, more stable/cheap.
and make the problem even worse. lol. There's only one actual solution to this problem but no one wants to talk about it :)
How would solar, which these companies are fighting, make it worse!?
Solar would make it worse because the religious dogma says we must de-industrialze and do degrowth. Replacing fossil fuels with solar or anything else is like wearing condoms or using PReP instead of abstaining from sex. To the faithful that's worse because it allows the sin to continue. The only approved answer is abstinence.
"Forgive me nature, for I have sinned..."
i assume you're talking about guillotines
It appears you're being downvoted, but I think this is an extremely normal reaction. See my post above, come ask your questions on Wednesday!
How exactly do you think you are going to die in a heatwave? Please explain the logistics of this.
The 2003 European heat wave killed an estimated 70,000 people: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_European_heatwave
Logistically (from wikipedia): Elderly people living by themselves had never faced such extreme heat before and did not know how to react or were too mentally or physically impaired by the heat to make the necessary adaptations themselves. Elderly people with family support or those residing in nursing homes were more likely to have others who could make the adjustments for them. This led to unexpected survival rates with the weakest group having fewer deaths than the more physically fit; most of the heat victims came from the group of elderly not requiring constant medical care; often childless women who lived alone.
Academic source: https://comptes-rendus.academie-sciences.fr/biologies/articl...
In Europe, during each heatwave of the recent years, some people have died.
Obviously, until now the victims have been among the most vulnerable, i.e. old people with cardiovascular diseases.
Nonetheless, there is a non-negligible risk that in the future the heatwaves will become so intense that they could affect even the healthy people.
In most countries the majority of the people cannot afford air conditioning.
Statistically, about 8 times more people die from cold environment. You'll be ok.
Multiple studies: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48524696
Isn't this post a classic example of the propaganda strategy of whataboutism?
Isn't this post whataboutism when studies and statistics are present?