dagblog - Comments for "What if green products make us pollute more?"

After mangling the Swedish

quinn esq — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 19:47:05 +0000

In reply to What if green products make us pollute more?

After mangling the Swedish experience - and providing absolutely NO links or sources or figures - buddy goes after the Chinese. Ooooooh, always good, the Chiiiiiiineeeeeeese. Here:

"American industry hungrily targets the rising Chinese consumer class. For the sake of the planet, we better hope it doesn't get its way. Consider: China's car ownership rate is about one-sixth that of the U.S. If China achieves rates comparable to the U.S., that would put an additional 800 million cars on the road. And that's just China. Even if we somehow succeeded in making China's fleet super-efficient, it would still be more than the planet can handle.... Of course, the Chinese will also want more electronics, clothes, meat, processed foods, bigger houses. In short, we can bet that the rising Chinese middle class will want something close to what we have. And why shouldn't they?... Everyone is betting, hoping (assuming?) that technology will eventually help us deliver the American dream worldwide with no environmental impact. But we may run out of planet by the time that day comes...."

So. "Technology can't save us." A fabulous phrase. Donno when the world got split into people who think it can versus people who think it can't, but I'm sure it's important to have really badly-thought out "debates" about this.

Anyhoo. We then get to the punchline. You and I have to totally transform our lives. As follows, "If this is chilling — and it should be — you might wonder, what are our options? Fairness demands that we cannot prevent, much less discourage, the growing global consumer class from having the consumer goods we enjoy. Real change starts with us then, and I'm afraid to say that radical change is in order. We must figure out a way to consume less, which means driving less, shopping less, eating less meat (which the U.N. estimates is responsible for one-fifth of all greenhouse gases), and conserving food and energy. This means essentially rethinking our suburban-sprawling, fast-food-gorging, shopaholic society. We must model for the world...."

Great. I've worked my whole life on BOTH efficiency AND renewables and other new technology, but apparently, this dipstick - Firmin DeBrabander, the chairman of the Humanistic Studies Department at the Maryland Institute College of Art - thinks we now have to do this with one hand, efficiency only.

Do you think this person has done the math? Try it. Assume the world's technologies are to be frozen in place, and we Westerners have to change (i.e. "reduce") our environmental output sufficiently to allow the rest of the world to obtain a sustainable, human, level of subsistence.

I donno, here's a back of envelope shot at it. Let's say there are 1 billion people in "developed" nations, and 6 billion in developing. Then, looking at lifestyles in China, India, Indonesia, Brazil, Africa, and so on, I'd estimate an average tripling of their consumption of materials through meat, transportation fuel, light and power, heating and cooling, etc. Seem fair? (After all, India, Pakistan, Nigeria and so on have per capita incomes of around $3,000 only, while we're at >$40,000. So that would take them to 1/4 of ours.)

Anyone trying the math? Basically, if we want to 3X the per capita income of India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Egypt and South Africa, the people of the United States have to reduce their consumption by 100%.

The world is already out of whack, and throwing out excess emissions. It's not sustainable. And yet we've now got another 6 billion people racing to try to have SOME sort of life.

So... what the hell is wrong with guys like this DeBrabander? Why can't we just say, "We need new technologies, cleaner ones, AND we need to cut back on meat, drive less, live in smaller homes, etc."

Fail.

As for the rest of the

quinn esq — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 19:24:50 +0000

In reply to What if green products make us pollute more?

As for the rest of the article, it's impressive just how full of shit it is. It reads like an academic's plea to "fire me."

1st off, Sweden has apparently seen rising transportation emissions, even after all its good car stuff. Well, except that the latest figures I've seen show no such thing. Here's the latest - December 2010 - annual report by Sweden to the UN under Kyoto. Which, near as I can read it, (WArning, 2 MB PDF file) shows (page 61) that passenger car emissions are down since 1990, while FREIGHT transport is up. Which - sorry - does not show that passenger vehicles becoming greener means people are flooding to the suburbs or whatever. If they rose a couple of % from 2009 to 2010, sorry but I'd suspect that's the recession and recovery, not some grand Devonsian shift.

Also, here's the announcement, entitled, "Record Reduction in Swedish Emissions" from Dec/2010. You can read about the disastrous situation that Sweden's intensive pursuit of greening has gotten them into, in the following paragraph, "Swedish greenhouse gas emissions are declining substantially. In 2009, emissions fell by over 3.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents, the largest reduction in any single year to date* . This means that Sweden's total emissions have now dropped by a total of around 17% since 1990, and levels have never been lower."

You know, they only emit 5.6 tonnes per person now (abut a quarter of the US and Canada.) And their total emissions are down 17% since 1990, even though the population has grown by 11%. Not bad.

I think I'll keep going on

quinn esq — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 19:24:31 +0000

In reply to What if green products make us pollute more?

I think I'll keep going on this one, as it really does deserve a proper burial. Buddy says, "Based on Sweden's experience with green cars, it's daunting to imagine their possible impact here. Who can doubt that they'll likely inspire Americans to make longer commutes to work and live even further out in the exurbs — bringing development, blacktop and increased emissions with them?"

Now, let's stop and think about this.

1st, electric cars DO create technical pressures, but more likely to live within their limitations. The biggest of which is... their shorter range. Not longer, shorter.

2nd electric cars will clean up the tailpipe emissions issue as well as reduce a huge amount of urban noise. Which will make urban areas MORE liveable, not less. etc.

Bunk. The right-wing think

quinn esq — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 19:05:30 +0000

In reply to What if green products make us pollute more?

Bunk. The right-wing think tanks have won another round, by bellyaching about pseudo-intellectual concepts like "the Jevons effect" widely enough that it catches on even in articles like this one.

I mean, it's a clever idea, as long as you don't think about it too long. At which point, it starts to sound absurd, even laughable. If something gets cheaper, I'm going to spend ALL my savings on getting more of that thing?? SOME, yes. But it just gets on its face absurd - as well as becoming entirely free from that nasty "evidence" thing - when it's pushed to claim I'm gonna claw back most or all of the savings.