Carbon emission reduction: News and technology

[JimC]

This thread has become more of a Brian vs mac thing. Boring.

[Brian Peacock]

I like to have my views challenged - because I have to defend them to teachers, heads, students and their parents. So I'm just trying to encourage mac to challenge these perspectives with something other than declarative assertions.

[Brian Peacock]

Economic assumptions prioritise the profits of emitters over the viability of the biosphere for long term ecological health. This is never more obvious than the fossil lobby being able to give $1bn to the Trump campaign, and by that secure the c.$700bn pa the fossil sector receives in govt subsidies tax breaks, and deferred costs.

Democrats and climate groups ‘too polite’ in fight against ‘malevolent’ fossil fuel giants, says key senator

The Democratic party and the climate movement have been “too cautious and polite” and should instead be denouncing the fossil fuel industry’s “huge denial operation”, the US senator Sheldon Whitehouse said.

“The fossil fuel industry has run the biggest and most malevolent propaganda operation the country has ever seen,” the Rhode Island Democrat said in an interview on Monday with the global media collaboration Covering Climate Now. “It is defending a $700-plus billion [annual] subsidy” of not being charged for the health and environmental damages caused by the burning of fossil fuels. “I think the more people understand that, the more they’ll be irate [that] they’ve been lied to.” But, he added, “Democrats have not done a good job of calling that out.”

...

While Whitehouse slams his fellow Democrats for timidity, he blasts Republicans for being in the pocket of the fossil fuel industry, an entity whose behavior “has been downright evil”, he said. “To deliberately ignore [the laws of physics] for short-term profits that set up people for huge, really bad impacts – if that’s not a good definition of evil, I don’t know what is.”

...

Long before Donald Trump reportedly told oil company CEOs he would repeal Joe Biden’s climate policies if they contributed $1bn to his 2024 presidential campaign, Republicans went silent on climate change in return for oil industry money, Whitehouse asserted. The key shift came after the supreme court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling, which struck down limits on campaign spending. Before that, some GOP senators had sponsored climate bills, and John McCain urged climate action during his 2008 presidential campaign.

But Citizens United, Whitehouse said, “told the fossil fuel industry: ‘The door’s wide open – spend any money you want in our elections’”. The industry, he said, promised the Republican party “unlimited amounts of money” in return for stepping away from bipartisan climate action: “And since 2010, there has not been a single serious bipartisan measure in the Senate.”

Whitehouse said that after delivering 300 climate speeches on the Senate floor, he has learned to shift from talking about the “facts of climate science and the effects on human beings to calling out the fossil fuels’ massive climate-denial operation”.

He said: “Turns out, none of [the science] really matters while the operation is controlling things in Congress. I could take facts from colleagues’ home states right to them, and it would make no difference because of this enormous, multibillion-dollar political club that can [punish] anyone who crosses them.”...

[pErvinalia]

Whitehouse for the White House!

[pErvinalia]

This thread has become more of a Brian vs mac thing. Boring.

They at least come at each other with information and facts. I get something out of it.

[macdoc]

Except Brian complains without providing realistic solutions.....yes boring.

[Brian Peacock]

Except Brian complains without providing realistic solutions.....yes boring.

As I've mentioned before - I think you just haven't been paying attention.

The 'solutions' are inherent to, and flow consequentially from, the problems. The first step towards any meaningful solution is to acknowledge the scale and scope of the problem. Unfortunately for this dicussion, that's the part you characterise as 'complaining'.

For example, the aviation sector is a massive emitter that has a disproportionately adverse impact on Global Heating. When I tried to nudge you into acknowledging that you chose to characterised my comments as a personal insult ("pejoratives") and expressing a desire to knock civilization back to the stone-age. Although I've asked you directly, I'm still in the dark about why you're personally affronted by my comments or think that seriously addressing climate and related issues necessitates returning society to a pre-modern-era state.

So let me be clear - once again (and probably not for the last time).

The solutions all involve a rapid managed reduction in emissions. It is hardly surprising then that the various special-interest groups which represent the commercial interests of high-emitting sectors like aviation oppose this. Waiting for structural alternatives to be developed and implemented, or for novel or new tech solutions to come on stream before taking action to reduce emissions is not a viable option climatologically and environmentally speaking. Basically, all 'solutions' to the aviation emissions problem involve significantly fewer rather than increasing numbers of flights. Where the sector necessarily prioritises growth the solutions necessarily prioritise the long-term stability and viability of the biosphere. These two positions are antithetical.

There are many ways to achieve this (rationing, quotas, moratoriums, emissions budgets, sustained disinvestment, carbon and pollution pricing, tax reform, etc etc), but given that aviation's sphere of operations is truly global, if the 'solutions' are to have any meaningful impact the necessary action has to be taken at the international level by govts.

Although it is far from perfect, the only framework for in play by which this can possibly happen is the 2015 Paris Agreement that came into force internationally in 2018.

At the very least, govts should be proceeding along the various Paris-defined pathways towards halting the year-on-year increases in CO2/GHG by 2030 that they have already committed to. The majority of govts are failing to meet those commitments, and many - such as the US - have declared that they have no intention of keeping to them. This failure points to how govts are representing the interests of sectors like aviation above the interests and well-being of their own populations - not to mention above the interests of the vast majority of people around the world who want to see their govts take stronger and swifter climate action.

Now that's out of the way - yet again. You declared the IPCC projected emissions from aviation were "irrelevant" and subsequently justified that by implying that the data provided was somehow both exaggerated and too conservative, and/or political. By contrast I provided data from the sector itself which was in full alignment with the IPCCs projections - and on which you are yet to comment. I invite you to do that now because sticking to the "irrelevant" line, along with taking personal exception to others talking about it, looks a lot like a reluctance to acknowledge and face up to the scale and scope of the issues at hand. So, what says you to that?

[Brian Peacock]

A pilot talks about aviation and climate...

Climate anxiety meant I could no longer work as a pilot. But I love flying – and I know we can transform aviation

I love flying. I’ve wanted to be a pilot since I was young. I grew up in Chichester, West Sussex, under a flight path used by Gatwick airport planes, and used to watch as they traversed the sky. In 2019, once I had qualified as an airline pilot, I began working for easyJet. Aviation connected me to my extended family in Canada, exposed me to different cultures and gave me an unforgettable career. But in November 2022, I handed over my airport ID card for the last time. I had grown increasingly anxious about the effect that our industry was having on the planet and, deep down, I knew that my concern for the climate crisis meant being an airline pilot was damaging my mental health.

Despite no longer working in the industry, my love of aviation has driven me to protect our ability to fly for future generations. It inspires me to address the uncomfortable realities and decisions our industry now faces. Everyone knows that aviation has a gigantic emissions problem. In 2022, the UK’s domestic and international flights produced 29.6m tonnes of CO2 equivalent emissions, accounting for about 7% of total UK greenhouse gas emissions. This is projected to increase to 11% by 2030, because while other sectors are decarbonising, aviation emissions will remain stable or even increase.

But the emissions problem stems from an even bigger problem. One report looked at emissions reduction and efficiency targets set by individual aviation companies over the past 25 years; all but one were missed and quietly abandoned. The industry knows that it’s a big contributor to the climate crisis, but decisions are made within power structures and processes that have failed to address these problems...

Short documentary...

Commercial pilots George Hibberd and Todd Smith grapple with the reality of their dream jobs, torn between childhood ambitions of flying and the impact of their industry on the world beneath them. From the cockpit, they witness first-hand the climate crisis unfolding below and decide to take drastic measures. As part of Safe Landing, a community of aviation workers who want the industry to do better for the climate, they begin to transform their eco-anxiety and guilt into action. With an estimated 1.2 million passengers in the sky at any time, they ask when will society confront the urgent need to reimagine aviation - before it's too late.

Safe Landing: https://safe-landing.org/