this post was submitted on 09 Dec 2024
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Climate - truthful information about climate, related activism and politics.

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Discussion of climate, how it is changing, activism around that, the politics, and the energy systems change we need in order to stabilize things.

As a starting point, the burning of fossil fuels, and to a lesser extent deforestation and release of methane are responsible for the warming in recent decades: Graph of temperature as observed with significant warming, and simulated without added greenhouse gases and other anthropogentic changes, which shows no significant warming

How much each change to the atmosphere has warmed the world: IPCC AR6 Figure 2 - Thee bar charts: first chart: how much each gas has warmed the world.  About 1C of total warming.  Second chart:  about 1.5C of total warming from well-mixed greenhouse gases, offset by 0.4C of cooling from aerosols and negligible influence from changes to solar output, volcanoes, and internal variability.  Third chart: about 1.25C of warming from CO2, 0.5C from methane, and a bunch more in small quantities from other gases.  About 0.5C of cooling with large error bars from SO2.

Recommended actions to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the near future:

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (2 children)

why are the slabs of meat in little towels like they're on a spa day

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I am a fan of context. There were about 29.1 million vehicles on the road in the USA in 2023.

8 million is a lot, and part of the overall solution.

Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/859950/vehicles-in-operation-by-quarter-united-states/

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

The article is just about the u.k. The number would be larger for the u.s. due to both population size, and that the u.s. eats more meat, around 50% more. Although we do drive more per car here as well, so that may effect it as well.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

There are an estimated 1.475 billion cars/trucks/vans in the world, as of 2023. 8 million is 0.005% of 1.475 billion.

Now, if they're going by the number of vehicles in the UK, then that number is obviously different. 41.2 million estimated vehicles in the UK. 8 million is a significantly larger percentage in that equation (19.4%). They also don't mention whether they're talking about ICE or electric cars, but I think it's safe to assume ICE. In 2023 there were 851,000 licensed zero emissions vehicles in the UK, up 57% from the prior year.

I'm a strong proponent for cutting your beef, lamb, cheese, coffee, and chocolate consumption , as they're among the worst, emissions-wise (bearing in mind this chart is by kilogram, not by calorie) by a long-shot, but we should be realistic about the things that are likely to do the most good.

We recommend four widely applicable high-impact (i.e. low emissions) actions with the potential to contribute to systemic change and substantially reduce annual personal emissions: having one fewer child (an average for developed countries of 58.6 tonnes CO2-equivalent (tCO2e) emission reductions per year), living car-free (2.4 tCO2e saved per year), avoiding airplane travel (1.6 tCO2e saved per roundtrip transatlantic flight) and eating a plant-based diet (0.8 tCO2e saved per year). These actions have much greater potential to reduce emissions than commonly promoted strategies like comprehensive recycling (four times less effective than a plant-based diet) or changing household lightbulbs (eight times less).

^https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aa7541/pdf^

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (3 children)

I wish cloned meat was a viable thing. No animal suffering, far less pollution, sticking it to the vegan.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (4 children)

There are great alternatives today like impossible, beyond and tofurky. There’s no need to wait for lab grown meat. That’s like saying sticking it to the abolitionists and feminists. It’s silly to want to stick it to the most moral people in the world.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

No idea what that is about, maybe because I do want to eat meat, without the moral implications.

Anyway, I doubt I can get away with it in this conservative shithole country. If I didn't live with my parents, I would have cut meat quite a lot. I actually prefer salads and such.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)
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