[voldacar]

>A typical plant takes ~20 years from decision to productionized

If this were truly "code red" and people really believed that, we would find a way to push the bureaucrats out of the way and build nuclear capacity way sooner than 20 yrs. Humans can do amazing things under dire stress.

This is not happening, so I will assume "code red" is hyperbole, something that the IPCC is not entirely known to shun.

[outworlder]

> This is not happening, so I will assume "code red" is hyperbole

If you take the current pandemic as an example of what we do when under dire stress, I don't think we should be that confident. Yes, some people can perform astonishing feats, and yet other people can deny there's even a problem even when it's obvious.

[GVIrish]

Humans don't always react rationally in code red situations though. Right now the irrational fear of nuclear power is stronger than the fear the average person or politician has of climate change. Doesn't mean that the climate change situation isn't dire.

[dakna]

> people really believed that

> we would find a way to

In this case "people" and "we" just doesn't refer to the same cohort.

[bertil]

> I will assume "code red" is hyperbole, something that the IPCC is not entirely known to shun.

I'm not sure that’s the case and I would encourage you to dig into what the worst or medium range scenario would mean. As I understand it, the _middle_ scenario predicts that a billion people would either die in a climate-related catastrophe or be displaced before 2050. That means that several ethnic or cultural groups would go through essentially genocide.

There are details like loss of water reserves in California and the impact on food access in the US, fish population collapse, climate-related migration from the densest populated areas in the world that are very concerning.

I’ve seen scientist give very clear alarms on several global issues (usually my father was making the point); I’ve personally made several myself, and every single time, the reaction was… dumbfounding: trying to minimise, negotiate, taking the most optimistic scenario as a worst case, delaying…

I have, unironically, witnessed several conversations that literally went:

“If you do that, you, your family and your way of life will die forever.

— You are exaggerating, that’s too scary.”

They did nothing, and soon later: exactly what the prediction said.

This is not only the most common scenario, it is the only scenario I’ve seen, with one exception: CFC and the Ozone layer. And that was because there’s a handful of industrials, who had clear alternatives that proved cheaper.

“Other people do nothing; I’d rather believe the reassuring story than evidence” is exactly how we end up with the bystander effect.