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 Originally Posted by BennyLaRue
Scientists have discovered that one of the worst things for the ozone layer is nitrous oxide. Therefore, I conclude that if we kill all dentists, Vin Diesel and those bastards from Pimp My Ride, the earth will be saved.
Ok, now, srsly, I think we all know there is a problem and those that don't won't be convinced by a stranger posting in a poker forum. So, what should be done at the personal level, wuf?
It's hard to say. The reason is that individuals cannot solve this problem. Like I said about Al Gore, his carbon footprint is colossally high, but contrarily, he may go down in history as being one of the most important persons to ever live. That may be laughable now, but when we're at 3-4C above pre-industrial, tons of people are going to be thinking 'why didn't anybody warn us?????'
So, here's what I think: if you want to make a difference, it's at the political level. Do what you can to change the political climate. This is much harder than most would think though since we already have a President and Secretary of Energy who understand the problem rather well, but little is being done due to corporatocracy and dumbfuckery. Even the cap and trade bill is by itself quite worthless. However, in certain ways it's easier.
Honestly, I think the best thing that individuals can do on a realistic level is to contribute to campaigns in close races against staunch supporters of dirty energy lobby and superstitious retards. As a side point, this is basically what happened to Jim Leach. He was one of the primary movers in the UIGEA, he was up for reelection in a very close race, and he lost because of the influx of money and votes that his opponent received from poker players. Even Leach acknowledges that it was because of poker and UIGEA that he lost. Nate Silver over on 538.com has written about how he was one of the many poker players to donate to Leach's opponent just because of UIGEA.
This is going to be a very long fight, and the corporate lobby has learned from its mistakes from previous battles (like tobacco, even some of the people involved with oil corporations currently have been outed as having worked with tobacco back then)
Now on a strictly personal level
- don't fly
- go vegan
- use public transportation
- buy local
- don't waste anything you've bought
- don't use as much AC or heating
- short showers
There are lots of things, but they're also quite burdensome for all but the hardcore. Even though I am a huge proponent of fighting AGW, I still won't personally advocate for individuals to delete from their luxuries to help the fight (because it ultimately does not work, plus it sucks). The solution is for enough investment to be placed in developing cheap and scalable renewables to become the best economic choice, then we'll see everybody start using them at the very base of energy
Now for rather simple things that can be done that aren't much of a pain
- paint your roof white or next time shingles are replaced get white ones
- get well insulated windows
- call your energy company and ask them if they offer energy from renewables, then ask for yours to come from that exclusively (will be more expensive, but in some places only by like a couple dollars a month, or so I've heard)
Not all these things are created equal though. Air travel is substantially more GHG intensive than anything else. Eating meat regularly is probably number two on the list. Color of roof is also a big player. If all roofs had always been white there probably wouldn't even be any doomsaying at this point.
But really, the thing that is going to change things is economy and peak oil. Eventually (sooner than most think) fossil fuels are just going to be too expensive, and will absolutely devastate the global economy. If you think the crisis of 08 was bad, this is going to be waaaaaaaaaaay worse, and it may even come on before we fully recover from the current recession. IMO, there's an argument to be made about consuming as much energy as you possibly can so as to make the price of oil too high more quickly so renewables begin to replace them. The sooner the better due to lag effects of climate change.
But we're not even in the worst of creating AGW. Lots of very dirty methods of making oil are not in use due to expense, but you can be damn sure that they will once oil sits high enough. Even around 100$ a barrel as standard should be enough to open up a whole plethora of extra dirty sources. But modernization and exponential growth in consumption will make sure that we use up all those sources quite quickly. Keep in mind that the last doubling time of consumption consumes equivalent to slightly more than the entire previous consumption, and only a decade ago the global oil consumption was working on a doubling time of around 12-15 years.
But that's not what's actually going to happen since in the last doubling time consumption will plummet due to price (and that's when economies will become devastated), and we'll see exponential decrease instead of increase in consumption.
Okay so I know my posts are super long and I rabbit trail all the time, so I'll just answer the question succinctly: put money into the right political races, and be cognizant of your energetic consumption.
We're in a catch 22. Simply living a modern life means carbon footprint is huge due to that modern life being based in oil. If you wanted to be truly carbon neutral you would either have to be carbon negative in enough ways to counteract the plethora of carbon consumption that comes from living in modern society, or you could become like Chris McCandless, or you could go on a killing spree
Seriously, this is how bad it is, somebody who goes on a fucking killing spree has done more for mother earth than most of us. It's so stupid. But a lot of things that just seem 'wrong' are actually great for the climate. Simply not having a child means that carbon footprint is much lower than anybody with children. But that's obviously not something that you want to tell people.
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