[bmitc]

The "radical" solutions are not just throwing more technology at the problems. That's how we got ourselves into this mess in the first place.

The solution is to stop mindless consumption. We use the same material to wrap and bake food and drink unhealthy drinks as we do to build airplanes. We use plastic for use cases that take place over seconds and minutes and then throw it away. We drive everywhere because of poor urban design. We use plastic to carry food home from stores and restaurants. We fill our homes with plastic, metal, wood, and electronic junk, very little of it actually needed.

Mindless consumption makes the U.S. waste 1/3 of the food produced every year. 96% of that goes directly into landfills. It is literally throwing energy away, energy that we sapped away from the ground and ecosystems. Only 4% of the waste is composted. Full adoption of composting food waste and reducing it in total could bring emissions down by as much as high single digits or low teens percentages.

We also need greater wealth equality, which brings education and health equality as well.

It's almost silly how simple the real solutions are.

I planted milkweed last year, or rather let the milkweed that the previous owner would put mulch over. Surprise, we have monarch caterpillars this year.

There are real consequences to our actions, and if we reverse them, we get real consequences back.

[beefield]

> It's almost silly how simple the real solutions are.

Simple? Real? Let me give you some numbers. Let's use electricity as a proxy for consumption[1].

Average global per capita electricity consumption is currently about 3000 kWh/a. To put that into context, you can drive your environmentally friendly EV (20kWh/100km) roughly 15 000 km (10 000 miles) and use no more electricity at anything during the year.

US electricity consumption is ~12 000 kWh per year. So if you want to not force third world to poverty forever and keep the global consumption at current levels (I'm not yet discussing decreasing global consumption, just keeping it at current levels). US folks would need to cut their consumption by 75% to allow the poorer to get even.

Sorry, but that is neither simple nor real. If we want to see the poor countries to rise to even mediocre living standards, we will face a huge increase in global consumption. You do not need to like this (I do not), but it is a fact. So please, stop whining about the need to reduce our consumption and start supporting initiatives how we can produce lots more energy and stuff sustainably. Because we need to do that.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electrici...

[bmitc]

There's a lot in this comment that I think responds to things I'm not saying and provides some arguments that are not clear cut. I don't see how electricity is a good proxy for consumption and waste. What does electricity usage in the U.S. measure for manufacturers in other countries making everything and the processes used to do that? Also, In the U.S., poverty and consumption and wealth inequality are all increasing. Thus, increasing consumption to pull people out of poverty does not work logically, at least in the U.S.

> If we want to see the poor countries to rise to even mediocre living standards, we will face a huge increase in global consumption.

Why does reducing overall consumption in developed countries and reducing conspicuous and vacuous consumption everywhere hurt developing countries? There are different levels and definitions of consumption and energy consumption is not the only one and not what I meant or described.

> we can produce ... stuff sustainably

Producing things more sustainably was part of my point.

I guess maybe the final point is clearly defining what we mean by consumption. I view consumption that extends beyond providing a moderate way of living, access to healthcare and education, social services, and transportation to be harmful, and it's that excess that I think should be reduced everywhere. There's no reason why developing countries should not be able to learn what a travesty much of the developed world is and adjust what it means to become more developed.

[YeBanKo]

We are a family of four and yearly electricity consumption with working from home was around 6000 kWh. Your numbers for the US consumption are wrong.

[beefield]

1. Did you calculate in your per capita share of commercial/industrial use? 2. Feel free to provide more accurate numbers with a source.

[H8crilA]

Have you ever heard of poorer countries? Do you think that over the next decades they'll pursue basic life luxuries such as hospitals, brick and concrete houses, steel reinforced cities, asphalt roads, a car per family? It helps to look at world's energy production and consumption breakdowns.

[bmitc]

I'm not sure what your point is or what you're responding to.

[H8crilA]

To the comment above. The point is that fewer widgets is not going to cut it unless you force the poor countries to stay poor.

I assumed people know world's energy consumption breakdown (cement, food, heating, electrical energy, chemical processes, ...), and what does that imply if most of the world catches up to more or less developed levels. If not I recommend starting education there.

[bmitc]

I don't think reducing consumption is at odds with increasing the sustainability of energy, and I wouldn't and didn't suggest otherwise anyway. They both should be done.

> If not I recommend starting education there.

If you have some references to educate, then I'm more than willing to read them.

[yyyk]

>We use the same material to wrap and bake food and drink unhealthy drinks as we do to build airplanes

It's not the same material. There are thousands of types of very different plastics.

>We drive everywhere because of poor urban design

Reversing allegedly poor urban design is the work of decades.

[bmitc]

>> We use the same material to wrap and bake food and drink unhealthy drinks as we do to build airplanes

> It's not the same material. There are thousands of types of very different plastics.

Aluminum.

[numbers_guy]

I agree in principle. The reason we are not doing this is because it would destroy the economy and when that happens basically everything falls apart. We would still have enough food and essentials for everyone but loads of people would be without jobs and others would lose billions of wealth.

A fully green economy might be possible in the far future but the transition seems like it is going to take a century or more.

[myshpa]

We should send people like you together with phone sanitizers to search for a new planet.

You'll go first, the scientists will go in a second ship.

[numbers_guy]

I just explained why climate action is not being taken. I am not making any statement on the matter.

And I don't know what phone sanitizers are.

[myshpa]

I should not have reacted in the way I did, and for that I'm sorry.

I've tried to debunk your comment, but it would take a long time, so I rewrote it instead.

"We are not doing it so the nature will destroy the economy and when that happens basically everything falls apart. We then won't have enough food and essentials for everyone but loads of people would be without jobs and others would lose their homes, their livelihood or life even.

A fully green economy could be right around the corner, but instead the transition seems like it is going to take a century or more, which is not enough time not to enter societal and environmental collapse, so it seems more like an extinction level event."

> And I don't know what phone sanitizers are.

We're their descendants. Rejoice, you're in for a treat ... I suggest to you ... The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. You'll enjoy it (the book, not the movie!).

[goatlover]

This is a reddit-level comment.