[leonidasrup]

A lot of younger people think that building of solar power and wind power in the past years caused decrease of global CO2 emissions. In reality, global CO2 emissions have been increasing each year.

https://ourworldindata.org/co2-emissions

[ToValueFunfetti]

A lot of people think closing the blinds will keep their houses cooler in the summer. In reality, their houses get warmer in the summer.

[krige]

The per region and per capita graphs do tell something you might want to consider.

[leonidasrup]

Per region CO2 emissions don't matter, CO2 is a largely non-reactive gas, which is rapidly mixed throughout the entire troposphere in less than a year.

https://www.metlink.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/FAQ6_2.pd...

It's the total CO2 amount in atmosphere that determines radiative forcing.

The IPCC summarized the current scientific consensus about radiative forcing changes as follows: "Human-caused radiative forcing of 2.72 W/m2 in 2019 relative to 1750 has warmed the climate system. This warming is mainly due to increased GHG concentrations, partly reduced by cooling due to increased aerosol concentrations"

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

[myrmidon]

Regional emissions do matter for the conclusions you draw.

All high-income countries already trend down in emissions.

Global emissions are rising because poorer countries that were basically almost "no emission"/capita in the past are still catching up (but that catch-up is less steep than in the past because green energy is available from the get-go).

Conclusions would be: Emission reductions in rich countries need to be aaccelerated, and helping poor countries peak at a lower level would probably be prudent (but good luck selling such policies to alt-right voters).

"Renewable are not helping" is not a sensible conclusion.

[leonidasrup]

We can compare many metrics: CO₂ emissions per capita for different regions, cumulative CO₂ emissions, share of global cumulative CO₂ emissions.

https://ourworldindata.org/co2-emissions

Conclusions would be: it's not that renewables are not helping, it's renewables are not helping enough. We need global emissions tax. The European Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) is a step in the right direction, but still a very small step because it covers only production of few carbon-intensive goods imported to Europe.

[loloquwowndueo]

Imagine how much more they would have increased if it weren’t for all the solar and wind capacity.

[myrmidon]

To be fair, a lot of younger people also think that human extinction by climate change is a significant threat (it is not), while a lot of older people believe that a nuclear war could eradicate our species (also no).