Climate Change Thread

[a completely inoffensive name]

Oh, there's obvious tension between "we're fucked" and "the world seems to be finally laying the groundwork for decarbonization and the climate scientists I follow on twitter seem to be more optimistic over the past year." I guess it depends on one's definition of "we're" and "fucked" - the IEA report from a year ago outlining +~3* F by 2100 given contemporary trends would at least probably allow for the survival of global civilization in its familiar form.

Business as usual 2010 was 4-5 degrees, literally uninhabitable to 95% of multicellular life on earth.
Business as usual 2021 is 3 degrees, still fucked but not a hard reset for the planet.
Optimistic 2021 is 2-2.5 degrees and we are still engaged in massive adaption and a commitment to carbon capture and storage which has yet to begin in earnest.

So yeah, we are fucked. My only hope is that the trends only accelerate from here. Coal is projected to be removed from US electrical generation entirely by 2027. Countries are pursuing carbon neutral policies despite US absence and without any free-riders to be seen. Carbon heavy industries are preparing for the future, anticipating increasing hostility and investing into new technologies. Plastic industry is pursuing chemical recycling methods to make all types of plastic re-usable. Wonks are slowly turning back the negative perception of nuclear. Economics of renewables is already cost competitive to the point where planned orders of new coal plants in India and other countries have been cancelled, to be filled by solar plants.

At the same time, the 21st continues to be the century of biochemistry. We are unraveling the multi-faceted phenomenon of aging and scientists are already proposing serious therapies to mitigate its deleterious affects. So we could all be destined to be healthy centenarians, in which case we will all get to die by our own climate choices. Maybe that mentality will finally provide the impetus to make long-term thinking the default instead of the exception.