[toomuchtodo]

Clean tech will save the day (low carbon generation, batteries, electrification trajectories and rate of change, broadly speaking), but the global fossil industry will need to be dismantled faster than some will like. It is a matter of survival, not politics or economics. My hunch is there are not many globally who want to suffocate while trying to exist for shareholder value.

[tw04]

I think you’re grossly underestimating how much the average American can deny with the assistance of social media.

The number of people I personally know who thought the country was going to end on J6 who now call the entire thing a “political hoax” breaks my brain.

Not to mention the endless posts about “where are all the people claiming COVID was so deadly now?” Who literally completely ignore the MILLIONS of deaths caused by COVID…

Until these people have their own son or daughter killed by X - they’ll happily claim it’s not actually a problem. Or find something completely unrelated to blame instead if it doesn’t align with their Twitter feed.

[toomuchtodo]

https://www.politico.com/news/2026/02/27/solar-powers-newest...

https://www.pewresearch.org/2025/11/05/impact-of-climate-cha...

https://www.pewresearch.org/2025/08/19/global-climate-change...

https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2024/12/09/how-americans...

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/08/09/what-the-...

[lapcat]

> My hunch is there are not many who want to suffocate while trying to exist for shareholder value.

Have you... read the news lately? You say it's not a matter of politics, but the politicians are absolutely trying to roll back the clock, push dirty tech, eliminate all environmental protections and regulations.

[tw04]

You do us all a disservice by saying “the politicians”. The REPUBLICANS are attempting to ignore reality and burn more fossil fuels. Nobody else in America. Name the problem, otherwise you’re implying it’s a bipartisan effort.

[embedding-shape]

To be fair, looking from the outside, democrats don't seem to be very eager to do anything about it either, most politicians in the US seems to be playing for the same team; the rich and wealthy.

[tw04]

Huh??? Did you just miss Biden's entire term? Democrats literally passed a massive bill that included $783 billion in funds for renewable energy to fight greenhouse gas emissions. Exactly what else do you want them to do?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation_Reduction_Act

[lapcat]

Obama takes credit for U.S. oil-and-gas boom: ‘That was me, people’ https://apnews.com/article/business-5dfbc1aa17701ae219239caa...

You have to be born yesterday to believe that Democratic leaders haven't merely hand-waved and virtue-signaled about global warming for decades. I realized this back in the 1990s.

Democrats have superior rhetoric, and they are less openly hostile, but their long record of doing nothing to help is unsurpassed. They will fiddle while Republicans burn Rome. And don't forget that Joe Manchin for example was a Democrat, one who dominated Democratic policy during the Biden administration.

[M3L0NM4N]

We need to push for clean tech obviously. I disagree with Republicans blocking wind farm construction and rolling back regulations, but American energy independence is important for national security, which is a shorter term issue than climate change. And developing more domestic clean energy helps with that as well.

[HoldOnAMinute]

Exactly. As a Democrat my eyes were opened when I saw the senior leadership do absolutely nothing to impede Trump other than form a strongly worded tweet.

[knowaveragejoe]

You do the people causing this problem a great service with false equivocations like this. It is clear one group would prefer us to ignore the problem and do nothing at all - in fact encourage the problematic behavior - and the other would very much like to take action on the issue if they had the political power.

[lapcat]

> the other would very much like to take action on the issue if they had the political power.

They had political power! During the Biden administration, during the Obama administration, during the Clinton administration.

Al Gore is a famous environmentalist... for making a movie after he was out of power. What the hell did he do for the environment when he was literally in the Oval Office, at the side of the President?

[ceejayoz]

> What the hell did he do for the environment when he was literally in the Oval Office, at the side of the President?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_activism_of_Al_G...

Guy tried.

[specialist]

Are you familiar with the Copenhagen Interpretation of Ethics?

https://gwern.net/doc/philosophy/ethics/2015-06-24-jai-theco...

And Murc's Law?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murc%27s_law

[volkl48]

The Biden admin did try to make large-scale investments in renewables and policy changes to encourage the energy transition in the US. The situation at the end of the admin was far better than when it started.

Why are you using a tone that implies that's not the case?

[mrguyorama]

>During the Biden administration, during the Obama administration, during the Clinton administration

The president doesn't actually control much in the USA, despite the nonsensical shit republican congresses let them get away with. Obama, Biden, and Clinton could not do anything that wasn't approved by congress.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Party_divisions_of_United_Stat...

Democrats have not really held enough power to do anything at all in like 40 years. A 1 or 2 vote "majority" in a chamber is not really meant to allow you to do anything.

Hell, that very first graph makes it pretty clear why shit is so bad in the US, we used to actually fire congress and replace them with different people.

[knowaveragejoe]

I'm sorry but if you are trying to both-sides this issue then you are either woefully uninformed or just being contrarian for the sake of it.

[analognoise]

You’re talking badly about the people who actually crafted real industrial policy for clean energy. It was dismantled by Trump and Republicans - even when the output was going to be a factory making batteries on US soil, wind and solar farms, etc.

Like the Republicans are absolutely embarrassing on this issue, the idea that they’re “two wings of the same bird” is nuts.

[specialist]

I'm old enough to remember the Obama Admin's support for the nascent battery and PV industries.

Ditto Biden Admin's support for our transition to renewables (IIJA, IRA). Unprecedented. The type of Keynesian investment in the USA (industrial policy, pro-labor) unseen since FDR's New Deal.

> don't forget that Joe Manchin

No one on the left ever will.

That said, it's important to note that the Democratic (center-left) coalition is wicked hard to hold together.

Have you read Caro's (epic) biographies of LBJ? It's amazing how much skill, subterfuge, and manipulation was required to pass progressive legislation over the objections of the die-hard reactionaries.

Everything about politics sucks. Chaos, apathy, nihilism, grifting are the default. It's absolutely amazing that anything gets done at all. So we should celebrate, and learn from, the occasional success.

[lapcat]

> So we should celebrate, and learn from, the occasional success.

What success? It's too late. The time for decisive action was decades ago. The worst case scenario is occurring now. Humanity totally failed to avert a disaster. We've already blown past the global temperature thresholds that scientists warned about. Now we're going to have to deal with the consequences. There's no going back in time to prevent it. This was never a problem that we could wait on for "the occasional success."

[specialist]

Methinks our current path has been determined since ~1980, with ~2000 probably being the last chance we had to stay under 1.5C.

So, well, whaddya gonna do?

The trick is deluding oneself that we can somehow muddle thru this. (Humanity has in fact survived worse.) Otherwise I wouldn't get out of bed in the morning. Is that reasonable? If not, then I might as well soldier on.

[embedding-shape]

> but the politicians are absolutely trying to roll back the clock, push dirty tech, eliminate all environmental protections and regulations

Yes, in one country who seems hellbent on destroying itself.

But looking globally, more and more countries seems to get it at this point, and at least move in the right direction, compared to others. The others will make themselves irrelevant faster than the others can reach a future without fossil fuels.

[lapcat]

> Yes, in one country who seems hellbent on destroying itself.

One of the largest countries in the world, measured by size, population, economy, and military. If you hadn't noticed, the US can do a lot of damage to the rest of the world all by itself. And pollution does not respect borders. Global warming does not respect borders.

[embedding-shape]

Right, but again, it'll matter less and less as the US hegemony is dying and other countries will pick up the torch, and the ones who are taking over seem to be a bit more willing to both commit and execute on plans to reduce pollution and global warming in general.

[lapcat]

> the US hegemony is dying

The US just deposed the leaders of two countries, Venezuela and Iran, but ok.

[embedding-shape]

> The US just deposed the leaders of two countries, Venezuela and Iran, but ok.

If that's how you judge what "empires" will be left in a decade, good for you, ignorance is a bliss sometimes I suppose. Don't look at how the average person live and survives, if you want to continue that way...

[pocksuppet]

But everyone wants everyone else to suffocate while delivering shareholder value for themselves. Classic Prisoner's Dilemma.

[obsidianbases1]

Where can I find some of that optimism in 2026?

[toomuchtodo]

https://ember-energy.org/focus-areas/clean-electricity/

https://ember-energy.org/data/china-cleantech-exports-data-e...

https://ember-energy.org/latest-updates/global-solar-install...

https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-e...

https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/indias-electrotech-...

https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/global-electricity-...

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-capaci...

https://ourworldindata.org/electric-car-sales

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/battery-price-vs-cumulati...

Trajectories are favorable and compelling. We can go faster though. “You can just do things.”

[throawayonthe]

that very much is a matter of politics, people should stop being afraid to acknowledge it

real politics are often concerned with survival

[qingcharles]

I thought the current policy was "Drill, baby, drill!"?

[lenerdenator]

I'd be willing to bet they go the Spaceballs route and make cans of oxygen a must-have item before they cut the emissions.

[HoldOnAMinute]

Perfect opportunity for a subscription. Amazon Oxygen. Subscribe and Save!

[AlexandrB]

> My hunch is there are not many globally who want to suffocate while trying to exist for shareholder value.

I hate this kind of hyperbole because it obscures the real dangers. No one is going to suffocate any time soon. Atmospheric CO2 is around 450ppm. The CO2 in a meeting room of a typical office can easily reach 1500ppm or more[1]. Is everyone in meeting rooms "suffocating"?

[1] https://www.popsci.com/conference-carbon-dioxide-tired-offic...

[johnboiles]

Also, these CO2 canaries are neat. We got one for our office https://a.co/d/02EKUci9

[johnboiles]

Yes in one way or another

[goodpoint]

I think you are being downvoted because people only skim "Clean tech will save the day" without reading the whole text.

[toomuchtodo]

I post to educate and inform, the votes are meaningless to me as an observer and scholar field reporting. Humans are tricky, mental models are rigid and can be tied to identity. Facts, data, and information stand on their own regardless of belief. Reality > incomplete or suboptimal mental models.

[boringg]

Nuclear will save the day in combination with clean tech.

Clean tech on its own is too slowly to be meaningfully impactful by the time we need it.

[toomuchtodo]

It takes ~ten years to build a nuclear generator. In that time, 10TW of solar PV will be deployed at current deployment rates (1TW/year), a bit higher than total global electricity generation capacity currently (~9TW).

Fusion is solved, at a distance, with solar, wind, and batteries. Half an hour of sunlight on Earth can power humanity for a year. Long duration storage remains to be solved for, but look how far we’ve come in 1-2 decades.

(at this time, short duration storage will likely be LFP, sodium, and other stationary friendly chemistries, but this could change as the state of the art advances rapidly and the commodities market fluctuates)

[boringg]

Fusion isn't in our lifetimes. Its been 10 years away since the 50s - only to get more R&D grant funding for budget building.

If it happened it would be a huge game changer for our economies but it is far away from deployment let along lab proven. It still requires more energy to start/maintain the reaction then it can produce - which is fundamental to success.

[toomuchtodo]

Solar and wind are fusion generated energy from the sun. “Fusion at a distance.” Fossil fuels are ancient sunlight, ancient fusion.

[boringg]

A step to far my friend. If we abstract away everything then nothing matters.

[toomuchtodo]

If you would like to bet how much nuclear will be operating in ten years, place your bet. I’m willing to bet $10k to a charity of the winner’s choice nuclear generation remains about the same total capacity as today while renewables scale to terawatts. Let me know if I should have a Longbet spun up for accountability.

https://longbets.org/

[triceratops]

I think you have that backwards. Building nuclear is slow slow slow. I can have new solar on my rooftop this year.

[boringg]

While that is true that there is a lag time to deploy nuclear - that is a vestige of the last 40 years of regulating it out of existence. That has changed - technology has improved and regulatory is under scrutiny. The difference is that once nuclear starts to roll out, as it will in the next 3-5 years, we will be seeing large deployments of clean dedicated load ripple through our electrical system in a product assembly line.

Solar and storage are great assets - and will continue to grow but they have other sets of constraints and deploy at small scale (relatively). The large scale deployments have long time horizons.

[triceratops]

The regulatory regime also affects large scale deployments of solar.

[boringg]

100%