If Klein had even just read the entry on Wikipedia
December 3, 2014 3:14 PM Subscribe
How about vice versa? On CBC this morning I heard an extremely interesting podcast (go down to the Preston Manning podcast under "Latest Audio" on the right) with Preston Manning, an old Canadian conservative, on how capitalism (read conservatism) can and should cure climate change. Towards the end he mentions the American political dichotomy that asks voters to choose either the environment or the economy. Manning argues we should choose both. He also has an interesting perspective on thinking globally and acting locally. Give him 5 minutes, and you won't turn him off.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 3:49 PM on December 3, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 3:49 PM on December 3, 2014 [2 favorites]
Capitalism in its current form can't continue. We cant grow indefinitely as long as we're using finite energy sources and materials as if they were unlimited while making our environment toxic at the same time. So that game will have to end. And as far as I know there's no other energy source that will allow us to over consume the way we do now.
We will have to change our lifestyles to some degree I think.
posted by Liquidwolf at 3:51 PM on December 3, 2014 [3 favorites]
We will have to change our lifestyles to some degree I think.
posted by Liquidwolf at 3:51 PM on December 3, 2014 [3 favorites]
Left to its own devices capitalism would externalise all costs until neck deep in it's own shit and then wonder why nobody was left to shovel it out.
posted by Artw at 4:08 PM on December 3, 2014 [26 favorites]
posted by Artw at 4:08 PM on December 3, 2014 [26 favorites]
>We cant grow indefinitely as long as we're using finite energy sources and materials as if they were unlimited while making our environment toxic at the same time
Solar power satellites in GEO with phase-locked ground stations are unlimited energy sources that don't make our environment toxic.
posted by mikelieman at 4:09 PM on December 3, 2014 [4 favorites]
Solar power satellites in GEO with phase-locked ground stations are unlimited energy sources that don't make our environment toxic.
posted by mikelieman at 4:09 PM on December 3, 2014 [4 favorites]
Capitalism has thus far failed to produce any such thing.
posted by Artw at 4:14 PM on December 3, 2014 [6 favorites]
posted by Artw at 4:14 PM on December 3, 2014 [6 favorites]
Solar power satellites in GEO with phase-locked ground stations are unlimited energy sources that don't make our environment toxic.
Interestingly, assuming we figure out the carbon remediation problem and get climate change under control, the second law of thermodynamics might kill us off in a few hundred years:
Interestingly, assuming we figure out the carbon remediation problem and get climate change under control, the second law of thermodynamics might kill us off in a few hundred years:
"It is interesting to note that humanity’s energy supply has doubled in the last 30 years. At this exponentially increasing pace, we will achieve K=1 in 300 years, and have an energy supply equal to the incident sunlight on Earth in 400 years. At this point, we will have doubled the Earth’s pre-industrial mid-infrared waste heat signature. In fact, this will be a new form of global warming that has nothing to do with greenhouse gasses: just by using energy for our own needs we will significantly warm the planet with the waste heat from our computers and electric cars and phones." (emph. added)posted by a lungful of dragon at 4:17 PM on December 3, 2014 [14 favorites]
Solar power satellites in GEO with phase-locked ground stations are unlimited energy sources that don't make our environment toxic.
That's great, but are we set up to harness that energy worldwide? And even so is it enough energy to keep us driving new cars and getting new iphones every 3 years?
posted by Liquidwolf at 4:18 PM on December 3, 2014
Previously, from a somewhat different perspective.
posted by fantabulous timewaster at 4:19 PM on December 3, 2014
posted by fantabulous timewaster at 4:19 PM on December 3, 2014
That's great, but are we set up to harness that energy worldwide?
People we like get the decryption key. People we don't get deathbeams.
posted by mikelieman at 4:23 PM on December 3, 2014
People we like get the decryption key. People we don't get deathbeams.
posted by mikelieman at 4:23 PM on December 3, 2014
People we like get the decryption key. People we don't get deathbeams.
What do the deathbeams run on? Solar?
posted by Liquidwolf at 4:27 PM on December 3, 2014
What do the deathbeams run on? Solar?
They get what Simcity 2000 called the "Oops".
posted by Pope Guilty at 4:38 PM on December 3, 2014 [5 favorites]
They get what Simcity 2000 called the "Oops".
posted by Pope Guilty at 4:38 PM on December 3, 2014 [5 favorites]
>We cant grow indefinitely
Done. From over a year before a lungful of dragon's link, basically the same conclusion. And that's without any resource limitations whatsoever.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 4:41 PM on December 3, 2014
Done. From over a year before a lungful of dragon's link, basically the same conclusion. And that's without any resource limitations whatsoever.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 4:41 PM on December 3, 2014
Even assuming we don't choke on our own carbon waste, unless we severely curtail energy usage per the linked 2000 W per person guidelines or move the whole operation into outer space and slap huge heat radiators on our future AIs, we'll very soon cook ourselves to death. The universe is an unremittingly harsh place to make a living, which would be funny if the current situation wasn't also as grim.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 4:55 PM on December 3, 2014
posted by a lungful of dragon at 4:55 PM on December 3, 2014
Solar power satellites in GEO with phase-locked ground stations are unlimited energy sources that don't make our environment toxic.
This is an ideal solution, but getting from where we are to there is an enormous leap. I used to think that global problems could be solved in this way, by simply coming up with the best solution and then building it - but human societies almost never work like that. Someone has to be first, putting an enormous amount of money into R&D, developing new techniques and learning how to build in space, facing unknown dangers and getting absolutely no money back for decades. NASA did it with the Moon program, but that was a race with the Russians. Private industry did it with railroads and canals, but that was in a different, wilder time, when financiers could go bankrupt in the morning and be rich again by afternoon.
We'll get there someday, but not without a lot of intermediate steps in-between. When it becomes easy enough for someone to do it with the kind of minimum risk that reassures bankers, they will.
posted by Kevin Street at 5:01 PM on December 3, 2014
This is an ideal solution, but getting from where we are to there is an enormous leap. I used to think that global problems could be solved in this way, by simply coming up with the best solution and then building it - but human societies almost never work like that. Someone has to be first, putting an enormous amount of money into R&D, developing new techniques and learning how to build in space, facing unknown dangers and getting absolutely no money back for decades. NASA did it with the Moon program, but that was a race with the Russians. Private industry did it with railroads and canals, but that was in a different, wilder time, when financiers could go bankrupt in the morning and be rich again by afternoon.
We'll get there someday, but not without a lot of intermediate steps in-between. When it becomes easy enough for someone to do it with the kind of minimum risk that reassures bankers, they will.
posted by Kevin Street at 5:01 PM on December 3, 2014
Capitalism in its current form can't continue. We cant grow indefinitely as long as we're using finite energy sources and materials as if they were unlimited while making our environment toxic at the same time. So that game will have to end. And as far as I know there's no other energy source that will allow us to over consume the way we do now.
We will have to change our lifestyles to some degree I think.
posted by Liquidwolf at 3:51 PM on December 3
Whale oil was a finite resource, so were trees, a century ago in Europe and North America. Now neither are. The same pretty much applies to every other resource on the planet, or in our solar system, etc.
posted by otto42 at 5:45 PM on December 3, 2014 [3 favorites]
We will have to change our lifestyles to some degree I think.
posted by Liquidwolf at 3:51 PM on December 3
Whale oil was a finite resource, so were trees, a century ago in Europe and North America. Now neither are. The same pretty much applies to every other resource on the planet, or in our solar system, etc.
posted by otto42 at 5:45 PM on December 3, 2014 [3 favorites]
Whale oil was a finite resource, so were trees, a century ago in Europe and North America. Now neither are. The same pretty much applies to every other resource on the planet, or in our solar system, etc.
I'm not sure what your point is.
Anyhow, solar and wind energy are basically infinite. And something doesn't have to be infinite to put it to good use. We could just do it in a more sustainable way.
posted by Liquidwolf at 5:56 PM on December 3, 2014 [1 favorite]
Holy crap the reviewer's rebuttal to Klein smacking her down was weak. It really seems the initial review was mostly written before the book was even read.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 5:58 PM on December 3, 2014
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 5:58 PM on December 3, 2014
I dunno, I thought Elizabeth Kolbert (who herself is a leading writer on climate change, just not as flashy as Klein) did a good smackdown. But I have never liked Klein, and have always loved Kolbert's writing.
Thank you for reading the link!
posted by Nevin at 6:17 PM on December 3, 2014
Thank you for reading the link!
posted by Nevin at 6:17 PM on December 3, 2014
Scientists Politely Remind World That Clean Energy Technology Ready To Go Whenever
posted by Cookiebastard at 7:01 PM on December 3, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by Cookiebastard at 7:01 PM on December 3, 2014 [2 favorites]
Whale oil was a finite resource, so were trees, a century ago in Europe and North America. Now neither are.
No, pretty sure they're still finite.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 8:18 PM on December 3, 2014 [9 favorites]
No, pretty sure they're still finite.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 8:18 PM on December 3, 2014 [9 favorites]
Climate change needs to be addressed.
Capitalism needs to be critiqued and checked.
Climate change AS a critique of capitalism, however, fails. Several varieties of socialist governments have been in charge of large segments of the population, some of which still are in charge, and they have not fared much better at limiting CO2. With the notable exception of northern European social democrat governments.
The problem is that we burn fossil fuels to address the needs of the present a the expense of the future, and pesky old human nature makes that sort of thing the bugbear of every institution designed for collective decision making. That includes the free market and every way in which we try to take various bailiwicks away from the market and onto some form of parilamentary decision making.
posted by ocschwar at 8:20 PM on December 3, 2014 [6 favorites]
Capitalism needs to be critiqued and checked.
Climate change AS a critique of capitalism, however, fails. Several varieties of socialist governments have been in charge of large segments of the population, some of which still are in charge, and they have not fared much better at limiting CO2. With the notable exception of northern European social democrat governments.
The problem is that we burn fossil fuels to address the needs of the present a the expense of the future, and pesky old human nature makes that sort of thing the bugbear of every institution designed for collective decision making. That includes the free market and every way in which we try to take various bailiwicks away from the market and onto some form of parilamentary decision making.
posted by ocschwar at 8:20 PM on December 3, 2014 [6 favorites]
European style social democracy has shown itself to be remarkably adept at adopting renewable energy. I wish America were still on track to having a similarly well-functioning political system.
posted by saulgoodman at 8:30 PM on December 3, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by saulgoodman at 8:30 PM on December 3, 2014 [2 favorites]
"So what does all this look like?"
"Mass migration, food and water shortages, spread of deadly diseases, endless wildfires… storms that have the power to level cities, blacken out the the sky, and create permanent darkness."
"Are you going to get in trouble for saying this publicly?"
"Who cares?" [via]
posted by ob1quixote at 8:53 PM on December 3, 2014
"Mass migration, food and water shortages, spread of deadly diseases, endless wildfires… storms that have the power to level cities, blacken out the the sky, and create permanent darkness."
"Are you going to get in trouble for saying this publicly?"
"Who cares?" [via]
posted by ob1quixote at 8:53 PM on December 3, 2014
Whale oil was a finite resource, so were trees, a century ago in Europe and North America. Now neither are. The same pretty much applies to every other resource on the planet, or in our solar system, etc.
The planet is littered with the remains of civilizations which ran out of key resources faster than they were able to find alternatives. Past performance is not a guarantee of future success.
posted by Kadin2048 at 9:01 PM on December 3, 2014 [11 favorites]
The planet is littered with the remains of civilizations which ran out of key resources faster than they were able to find alternatives. Past performance is not a guarantee of future success.
posted by Kadin2048 at 9:01 PM on December 3, 2014 [11 favorites]
Will Boisvert also posted a good critique of Klein's book on the Breakthrough Institute site.
This resonated with me: "For all its vehemence, Klein’s everythingism — her conviction that everything is threatened, that everything must change, that everything is settled about how to change, and that everything will be reconciled in the coming state of nature — falls far short of a useful call to action."
The idea that climate change is everything change reminds me of conservative demagogues who claimed 9-11 changed everything.
posted by Cassford at 10:36 PM on December 3, 2014 [2 favorites]
This resonated with me: "For all its vehemence, Klein’s everythingism — her conviction that everything is threatened, that everything must change, that everything is settled about how to change, and that everything will be reconciled in the coming state of nature — falls far short of a useful call to action."
The idea that climate change is everything change reminds me of conservative demagogues who claimed 9-11 changed everything.
posted by Cassford at 10:36 PM on December 3, 2014 [2 favorites]
The idea that climate change is everything change reminds me of conservative demagogues who claimed 9-11 changed everything.
Yeah, and being against air pollution is just like assaulting NASA employees for their role in faking the moon landing.
posted by Pope Guilty at 10:42 PM on December 3, 2014
Yeah, and being against air pollution is just like assaulting NASA employees for their role in faking the moon landing.
posted by Pope Guilty at 10:42 PM on December 3, 2014
We're not going to make any progress on climate change because it's become a tribal left/right issue. When its effects start significantly impacting rich countries we'll try to engineer our way out of it. Fingers crossed. I'm on an island, quite northerly, so I figure my children will survive.
posted by alasdair at 10:51 PM on December 3, 2014
posted by alasdair at 10:51 PM on December 3, 2014
When its effects start significantly impacting rich countries we'll try to engineer our way out of it.
I'm watching to see how Miami and Louisiana works out. That's pretty much 'significantly impacting rich countries', and I can't wait to see how they engineer their way out of this.
posted by mikelieman at 11:22 PM on December 3, 2014
I'm watching to see how Miami and Louisiana works out. That's pretty much 'significantly impacting rich countries', and I can't wait to see how they engineer their way out of this.
posted by mikelieman at 11:22 PM on December 3, 2014
Yeah, and being against air pollution is just like assaulting NASA employees for their role in faking the moon landing.
Looks like you are proving alasdair's point. How you took Boisvert's article and my reaction to it as anything like this nonsense is beyond me. My point was that hyperbole isn't usually a convincing tactic. And pinning the solution to climate change to a self-contradictory call for the end of "capitalism" is unlikely to solve the problem at hand and mostly just muddies the water. Climate change doesn't change everything and arguing that everything must change in order to move toward a solution is absurd.
posted by Cassford at 11:37 PM on December 3, 2014
Looks like you are proving alasdair's point. How you took Boisvert's article and my reaction to it as anything like this nonsense is beyond me. My point was that hyperbole isn't usually a convincing tactic. And pinning the solution to climate change to a self-contradictory call for the end of "capitalism" is unlikely to solve the problem at hand and mostly just muddies the water. Climate change doesn't change everything and arguing that everything must change in order to move toward a solution is absurd.
posted by Cassford at 11:37 PM on December 3, 2014
otto42: “Whale oil was a finite resource, so were trees, a century ago in Europe and North America. Now neither are.”
Steely-eyed Missile Man: “No, pretty sure they're still finite.”
I don't want to speak for otto42, but the only way his comment makes much sense is if he meant to say that whale oil and trees were a virtually infinite resource a century ago in Europe and North America, and now they aren't. That's pretty much true, as far as I can tell.
posted by koeselitz at 11:54 PM on December 3, 2014
Steely-eyed Missile Man: “No, pretty sure they're still finite.”
I don't want to speak for otto42, but the only way his comment makes much sense is if he meant to say that whale oil and trees were a virtually infinite resource a century ago in Europe and North America, and now they aren't. That's pretty much true, as far as I can tell.
posted by koeselitz at 11:54 PM on December 3, 2014
Can Climate Change Cure Capitalism?
Does Dioxide Denialism Doom Democracy?
Extreme Earthwarming Events -- Extreme Economic Effects?
Failing Floes Force Frightening Future Financial Failures?
Greenhouse Gases Garnering Greedheads Greenbacks?
posted by kyrademon at 3:23 AM on December 4, 2014 [4 favorites]
Does Dioxide Denialism Doom Democracy?
Extreme Earthwarming Events -- Extreme Economic Effects?
Failing Floes Force Frightening Future Financial Failures?
Greenhouse Gases Garnering Greedheads Greenbacks?
posted by kyrademon at 3:23 AM on December 4, 2014 [4 favorites]
Climate change doesn't change everything and arguing that everything must change in order to move toward a solution s absurd.
I don't know if you read Klein's book or summaries thereof, but what she is more specifically calling for is broad, structural changes to the consumption of energy on an industrial level. Pretty much any scientist who takes climate change seriously has said more or less the same. I'd hope it'd be obvious by now just how pressing an issue slowing or reversing the human influence on climate change is, but apparently this still gets dismissed as "hyperbole", regardless of how many of us are directly affected by climate change, and what it's going to take - if we're honest with ourselves - to make any kind of difference.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 4:42 AM on December 4, 2014 [4 favorites]
I don't know if you read Klein's book or summaries thereof, but what she is more specifically calling for is broad, structural changes to the consumption of energy on an industrial level. Pretty much any scientist who takes climate change seriously has said more or less the same. I'd hope it'd be obvious by now just how pressing an issue slowing or reversing the human influence on climate change is, but apparently this still gets dismissed as "hyperbole", regardless of how many of us are directly affected by climate change, and what it's going to take - if we're honest with ourselves - to make any kind of difference.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 4:42 AM on December 4, 2014 [4 favorites]
We're not going to make any progress on climate change because it's become a tribal left/right issue. When its effects start significantly impacting rich countries we'll try to engineer our way out of it. Fingers crossed. I'm on an island, quite northerly, so I figure my children will survive.
I live on the same island, about two feet above sea level. I wonder if mine will be allowed to come and stay.
posted by dng at 5:05 AM on December 4, 2014
I live on the same island, about two feet above sea level. I wonder if mine will be allowed to come and stay.
posted by dng at 5:05 AM on December 4, 2014
I don't want to speak for otto42, but the only way his comment makes much sense is if he meant to say that whale oil and trees were a virtually infinite resource a century ago in Europe and North America, and now they aren't.
No, otto42 definitely meant what he said. He's shown himself to be very conservative. I am sure the idea is that a century ago we were using whale oil and trees above replacement and now we are not, though really it's been more like a century and a half. However, saying they are no longer finite is a silly way to get that point across.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 5:24 AM on December 4, 2014
No, otto42 definitely meant what he said. He's shown himself to be very conservative. I am sure the idea is that a century ago we were using whale oil and trees above replacement and now we are not, though really it's been more like a century and a half. However, saying they are no longer finite is a silly way to get that point across.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 5:24 AM on December 4, 2014
I don't really understand where the bar for "changing everything" is set if a major global shift that affects every single human's daily life and threatens many of their existences doesn't clear the threshold.
posted by threeants at 5:25 AM on December 4, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by threeants at 5:25 AM on December 4, 2014 [3 favorites]
Why do people with absolutely no idea what they are talking about think they have to pitch in about these big issues? Naomi Klein? Doesn't even understand capitalism and the system that actually works in the west. You want to see capitalism? Free markets? Go to Somalia.
Nowhere in the west, thankfully, do we have free markets and unbridled capitalism. That's why we are rich, taking the best of both joining together as a society to regulate and choosing collective action to create wealth. Whether you are French (as anti-capitalist as it gets in the west, or American, scaring the rest as a psuedo-fascist corporatist state) we are all variants on the same model.
The truth is we can have what we have now, pretty much forever. At its ultimate reduction, making stuff is a matter of using energy to rearrange atoms. All the waste we have ever ever generated is still in the landfill we put it into. Except, and this is critical, where we pour it down the drain or throw it into the sky. A hundred years from now it will have to be a major crime to disperse effluent.
What we can't do is we can't put carbon into the sky.
We can't move to a low carbon economy with windmills and tidal and solar. Simply because there is no way to store electricity on the scales we are talking about. There isn't even a theoretical way to store that much energy without completely reformulating our economy - imagine the battery pack required to keep a smelter hot 24/7. You cannot have an industrialised economy on intermittent power. Just ask the Indians.
And this is why we are fucked.
People like the authors of the article assume implicitly that there is no alternative to the notion that low carbon = low energy. "Eco" people refuse to consider that we can and must separate energy production from carbon emission, because of the poor policy and design choices of the US and UK militaries in the 1950s.
You have a spare time machine and want to fix the future? Don't shoot Hitler, go shoot the bureaucrat who decided the way to to generate power was to build copies of the reactors that generate warheads, and not even consider how to dismantle them at the end of their useful lives.
The only way out that doesn't destroy our children's future in one way or another is Nuclear - Electric - Hydrogen. Replace all fixed site energy consumption with nuclear electric and moveable energy with Hydrogen generated by nuclear during the quieter periods of the day. While we use this last generation of nuclear plants we invest massively in the next round, fusion, thorium, space solar etc. The cost for a total replacement is about 3-4 times our current energy bills out to 2050 or so. That includes waste disposal. Add another multiple for the R&D costs and you are looking at a hell of a lot less money than the ongoing cost of dealing with the impact of carbon air pollution.
But none of this will happen because the "eco" people think nukular is eeeevil.
So we have crap like the articles linked above instead of serious and clear thinking. Because destroying our future, shortening our lifespans is the "right" way to live. Please stop giving these idiots the oxygen of publicity.
posted by Hugh Routley at 5:31 AM on December 4, 2014
Nowhere in the west, thankfully, do we have free markets and unbridled capitalism. That's why we are rich, taking the best of both joining together as a society to regulate and choosing collective action to create wealth. Whether you are French (as anti-capitalist as it gets in the west, or American, scaring the rest as a psuedo-fascist corporatist state) we are all variants on the same model.
The truth is we can have what we have now, pretty much forever. At its ultimate reduction, making stuff is a matter of using energy to rearrange atoms. All the waste we have ever ever generated is still in the landfill we put it into. Except, and this is critical, where we pour it down the drain or throw it into the sky. A hundred years from now it will have to be a major crime to disperse effluent.
What we can't do is we can't put carbon into the sky.
We can't move to a low carbon economy with windmills and tidal and solar. Simply because there is no way to store electricity on the scales we are talking about. There isn't even a theoretical way to store that much energy without completely reformulating our economy - imagine the battery pack required to keep a smelter hot 24/7. You cannot have an industrialised economy on intermittent power. Just ask the Indians.
And this is why we are fucked.
People like the authors of the article assume implicitly that there is no alternative to the notion that low carbon = low energy. "Eco" people refuse to consider that we can and must separate energy production from carbon emission, because of the poor policy and design choices of the US and UK militaries in the 1950s.
You have a spare time machine and want to fix the future? Don't shoot Hitler, go shoot the bureaucrat who decided the way to to generate power was to build copies of the reactors that generate warheads, and not even consider how to dismantle them at the end of their useful lives.
The only way out that doesn't destroy our children's future in one way or another is Nuclear - Electric - Hydrogen. Replace all fixed site energy consumption with nuclear electric and moveable energy with Hydrogen generated by nuclear during the quieter periods of the day. While we use this last generation of nuclear plants we invest massively in the next round, fusion, thorium, space solar etc. The cost for a total replacement is about 3-4 times our current energy bills out to 2050 or so. That includes waste disposal. Add another multiple for the R&D costs and you are looking at a hell of a lot less money than the ongoing cost of dealing with the impact of carbon air pollution.
But none of this will happen because the "eco" people think nukular is eeeevil.
So we have crap like the articles linked above instead of serious and clear thinking. Because destroying our future, shortening our lifespans is the "right" way to live. Please stop giving these idiots the oxygen of publicity.
posted by Hugh Routley at 5:31 AM on December 4, 2014
The truth is we can have what we have now, pretty much forever.
That's a mighty bold statement to make.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 6:12 AM on December 4, 2014 [2 favorites]
That's a mighty bold statement to make.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 6:12 AM on December 4, 2014 [2 favorites]
The real reason nuclear is struggling is that the financial demands of the tech (major, long-term up-front investments with no big payout in store) are not workable in the current social and political climate. Some part of the public has to shoulder those enormous up-front costs and risks, and that's a political hard-sell when everyone is already pinching every public penny and large works products are failing without delivering left and right. The claims that it's the overwhelming opposition of leftist environmentalists that's standing in the way of more rapid adoption of nuclear energy tech is just convenient scapegoating. The fact is, ordinary people--not "eco people" [sic]--don't want nuclear plants in their own neighborhoods, and ordinary people don't want their already stretched tax funding going to energy development projects that take decades to complete and cost massive subsidies before showing any benefit. It's ordinary people who aren't voting to see their utility bills hiked to develop nuclear capacity at some vague point in the future. It's not just eco-activism that's holding nuclear back. It's a massively over-engineered solution to the problem, and so there's more cost and risk associated with it.
posted by saulgoodman at 6:14 AM on December 4, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by saulgoodman at 6:14 AM on December 4, 2014 [2 favorites]
...and, of course, Fukushima and Chernobyl, the .0000001% possibilities that seemed to have amazingly happened twice in one generation.
posted by Orb2069 at 6:52 AM on December 4, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by Orb2069 at 6:52 AM on December 4, 2014 [2 favorites]
There are some forms of energy storage that scale, by the way.
posted by Orb2069 at 7:02 AM on December 4, 2014
posted by Orb2069 at 7:02 AM on December 4, 2014
Ultra-high voltage systems moot the question of storage by enabling the efficient transmission of electricity over very large areas. See "Ultra High Voltage (UHV) Transmission is the Renewable Energy Interstate" by John Whitney.
posted by No Robots at 8:01 AM on December 4, 2014
posted by No Robots at 8:01 AM on December 4, 2014
When its effects start significantly impacting rich countries we'll try to engineer our way out of it.
I'm watching to see how Miami and Louisiana works out. That's pretty much 'significantly impacting rich countries', and I can't wait to see how they engineer their way out of this.
posted by mikelieman at 11:22 PM on December 3
Louisiana created an entire state Authority in 2007 whose job it is to engineer a way out of the consequences of sea level rise. All state agencies must make decisions consistent with this authority.
http://coastal.la.gov/
Of course, this being Louisiana, it's against the party line for the government to name the cause of that sea level rise.
Also. this being Louisiana, the only record of the meetings are slides, but here's a link to the 2014 meeting agendas and slides.
http://coastal.la.gov/calendar/?y=2014
Thanks for thinking of us down here!
posted by eustatic at 8:41 AM on December 4, 2014 [1 favorite]
I'm watching to see how Miami and Louisiana works out. That's pretty much 'significantly impacting rich countries', and I can't wait to see how they engineer their way out of this.
posted by mikelieman at 11:22 PM on December 3
Louisiana created an entire state Authority in 2007 whose job it is to engineer a way out of the consequences of sea level rise. All state agencies must make decisions consistent with this authority.
http://coastal.la.gov/
Of course, this being Louisiana, it's against the party line for the government to name the cause of that sea level rise.
Also. this being Louisiana, the only record of the meetings are slides, but here's a link to the 2014 meeting agendas and slides.
http://coastal.la.gov/calendar/?y=2014
Thanks for thinking of us down here!
posted by eustatic at 8:41 AM on December 4, 2014 [1 favorite]
Coal to Approach Oil as Top Energy Source by 2017, IEA Says
“Thanks to abundant supplies and insatiable demand for power from emerging markets, coal met nearly half of the rise in global energy demand during the first decade of the 21st Century,” IEA Executive Director Maria van der Hoeven said. “Coal’s share of the global energy mix continues to grow each year, and if no changes are made to current policies, coal will catch oil within a decade.”posted by Golden Eternity at 9:26 AM on December 4, 2014
When I like to think about these kinds of things, I like to reread this comment. Then I drink a really fine scotch.
posted by eclectist at 10:01 AM on December 4, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by eclectist at 10:01 AM on December 4, 2014 [1 favorite]
We never see $80 per barrel again.
His predictions are way off. Maybe multiply his time frames by 10x-20x.
posted by Golden Eternity at 10:18 AM on December 4, 2014
His predictions are way off. Maybe multiply his time frames by 10x-20x.
posted by Golden Eternity at 10:18 AM on December 4, 2014
Whale oil imports
To clarify, whale oil was a finite resource, a century and more ago. It is certainly finite now, but not a resource, so it is no longer a finite resource. I would argue that trees are no longer a finite resource, whereas they were a century (and more) ago. Yes, trees remain a resource in North America and Europe, but not as a primary source of energy in those places. The reduction in the consumption of trees for energy use has allowed for the replacement rate to exceed the destruction rate, resulting in more trees.
Government mandates and laws, regulations and the good intentions of Greenpeace etc., did not have a lot to do, if any, with the drop in demand for whale oil and trees (as an energy source) over the past century plus. The drop in demand was due to an increase in the price of each, relative to a few other energy sources.
If only there was a system of rewards and punishments that discouraged the consumption of finite resources and encouraged the use of alternatives. The system would naturally not have the benefit of hindsight nor distort the information about the relative supply and demand of related resources at anyone time. Ideally, the collective intelligence and intentions of every energy consumer could be summarized in a single number.
posted by otto42 at 10:56 AM on December 4, 2014
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To clarify, whale oil was a finite resource, a century and more ago. It is certainly finite now, but not a resource, so it is no longer a finite resource. I would argue that trees are no longer a finite resource, whereas they were a century (and more) ago. Yes, trees remain a resource in North America and Europe, but not as a primary source of energy in those places. The reduction in the consumption of trees for energy use has allowed for the replacement rate to exceed the destruction rate, resulting in more trees.
Government mandates and laws, regulations and the good intentions of Greenpeace etc., did not have a lot to do, if any, with the drop in demand for whale oil and trees (as an energy source) over the past century plus. The drop in demand was due to an increase in the price of each, relative to a few other energy sources.
If only there was a system of rewards and punishments that discouraged the consumption of finite resources and encouraged the use of alternatives. The system would naturally not have the benefit of hindsight nor distort the information about the relative supply and demand of related resources at anyone time. Ideally, the collective intelligence and intentions of every energy consumer could be summarized in a single number.
posted by otto42 at 10:56 AM on December 4, 2014
But the free market doesn't accurately price environmental inputs (and here we get back to the topic of the FPP, I guess), because it cant take hidden costs into account that are usually absorbed by the ecosystem. People in the developed world didn't stop using whale oil and wood cook stoves because the price of blubber and wood got too high - they upgraded to more efficient, high density energy sources because of technological change. There are people in the developing world right now that collect firewood every day for cooking, and this has led to extensive deforestation in countries like Nepal.
People there don't buy firewood because it grows naturally. The "cost" of planting and watering the trees is borne by nature, over a period of decades, making the wood "free" for people, and a far more realistic choice for heating than the massive costs involved in building an infrastructure for electricity or natural gas. When the trees around a village are gone, the only real choice for people with no money is to go further away from home to get wood. Until eventually all the trees are gone, everywhere. And lest you think I'm being mean to Nepal, this is exactly the same as what we're doing with every other natural resource in the world, at different rates of consumption.
The problem here is that there's a difference between the energy source that's cheapest for people to use and the energy source that's cheapest for the ecosystem to provide, but capitalism can't quantify that difference.
posted by Kevin Street at 1:35 PM on December 4, 2014 [5 favorites]
People there don't buy firewood because it grows naturally. The "cost" of planting and watering the trees is borne by nature, over a period of decades, making the wood "free" for people, and a far more realistic choice for heating than the massive costs involved in building an infrastructure for electricity or natural gas. When the trees around a village are gone, the only real choice for people with no money is to go further away from home to get wood. Until eventually all the trees are gone, everywhere. And lest you think I'm being mean to Nepal, this is exactly the same as what we're doing with every other natural resource in the world, at different rates of consumption.
The problem here is that there's a difference between the energy source that's cheapest for people to use and the energy source that's cheapest for the ecosystem to provide, but capitalism can't quantify that difference.
posted by Kevin Street at 1:35 PM on December 4, 2014 [5 favorites]
People in the developed world didn't stop using whale oil and wood cook stoves because the price of blubber and wood got too high - they upgraded to more efficient, high density energy sources because of technological change.
The technological change didn't materialize out of thin air, or come about through decrees and mandates. At some point, some individuals figured out that the oil in Pennsylvania can be harvested more cheaply than harpooning sperm whales.
posted by otto42 at 3:23 PM on December 4, 2014
The technological change didn't materialize out of thin air, or come about through decrees and mandates. At some point, some individuals figured out that the oil in Pennsylvania can be harvested more cheaply than harpooning sperm whales.
posted by otto42 at 3:23 PM on December 4, 2014
More cheaply, or ultimately more profitable for them to provide, sure. But what we're facing today is a systemic problem, the result of a human population that's grown so large our choices affect the entire Earth, and there's no mechanism within capitalism that will guide individuals seeking profit from new technologies towards solutions that benefit the entire system. Instead, it tends to push people towards maximizing the resources that are cheapest to acquire, until those things are tapped out.
Renewable energy makes more economic sense in the long term, over a scale of decades or centuries, after the development costs are amortized away. But the free market is a system that efficiently arranges the trade of goods and services right now. Fifty years from now might as well not exist.
posted by Kevin Street at 4:00 PM on December 4, 2014 [3 favorites]
Renewable energy makes more economic sense in the long term, over a scale of decades or centuries, after the development costs are amortized away. But the free market is a system that efficiently arranges the trade of goods and services right now. Fifty years from now might as well not exist.
posted by Kevin Street at 4:00 PM on December 4, 2014 [3 favorites]
People really seem to struggle with understanding that time scales matter.
posted by saulgoodman at 4:03 PM on December 4, 2014
posted by saulgoodman at 4:03 PM on December 4, 2014
I'm sort of half kidding, but this is one reason that technology that extends human lifespans would be a good thing, even if only the super rich could buy it at first. Immortal robber barons would have to take a longer view and start investing in systemic solutions, lest their robbing spree be cut prematurely short.
posted by Kevin Street at 4:17 PM on December 4, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by Kevin Street at 4:17 PM on December 4, 2014 [1 favorite]
Renewable energy makes more economic sense in the long term, over a scale of decades or centuries, after the development costs are amortized away. But the free market is a system that efficiently arranges the trade of goods and services right now. Fifty years from now might as well not exist.
posted by Kevin Street at 4:00 PM on December 4 [1 favorite +] [!]
Renewable energy only makes sense if it is cheaper than the alternative. Just as pulling oil out of the ground became cheaper than cooking it out of dead whales.
Development costs of renewable projects is real cash money. Amortization is an accounting concept used to defer taxes and match revenue with expenses for corporate reporting purposes. If you want a new renewable energy technology to save the world, you are going to have a hard time finding investors that will accept a return of their cash investment, and a profit over centuries. It is a lot easier to ask investors to use their money if you give them a reason to believe they will get their money back sooner, rather than later.
I suppose you could always hope for a large not-for-profit institution to divert the investor's cash to a 1,000 year project and away from short-term for-profit endeavors.
After a while though, all of those trees start looking pretty cheap and warming, and at some price, probably whale blubber too.
posted by otto42 at 6:05 PM on December 4, 2014
posted by Kevin Street at 4:00 PM on December 4 [1 favorite +] [!]
Renewable energy only makes sense if it is cheaper than the alternative. Just as pulling oil out of the ground became cheaper than cooking it out of dead whales.
Development costs of renewable projects is real cash money. Amortization is an accounting concept used to defer taxes and match revenue with expenses for corporate reporting purposes. If you want a new renewable energy technology to save the world, you are going to have a hard time finding investors that will accept a return of their cash investment, and a profit over centuries. It is a lot easier to ask investors to use their money if you give them a reason to believe they will get their money back sooner, rather than later.
I suppose you could always hope for a large not-for-profit institution to divert the investor's cash to a 1,000 year project and away from short-term for-profit endeavors.
After a while though, all of those trees start looking pretty cheap and warming, and at some price, probably whale blubber too.
posted by otto42 at 6:05 PM on December 4, 2014
It is cheaper now. The tech has finally reached maturity and we're still not adopting it. Hell, in my state, they've effectively outlawed going off the grid. There's no major technical problems with renewables anymore, only political, social, and above all economic ones.
posted by saulgoodman at 6:48 PM on December 4, 2014
posted by saulgoodman at 6:48 PM on December 4, 2014
Immortal robber barons would have to take a longer view and start investing in systemic solutions, lest their robbing spree be cut prematurely short.
You have a more faith in human rationality than me.
Maybe if we can send them all to the moon to get the earthrise view as well...
/cut forwards to ruined earth ruled by immortal moon cultists.
posted by Artw at 7:02 PM on December 4, 2014
You have a more faith in human rationality than me.
Maybe if we can send them all to the moon to get the earthrise view as well...
/cut forwards to ruined earth ruled by immortal moon cultists.
posted by Artw at 7:02 PM on December 4, 2014
There's no major technical problems with renewables anymore, only political, social, and above all economic ones.
The same could be said about colonizing the moon.
posted by otto42 at 8:04 PM on December 4, 2014
The same could be said about colonizing the moon.
posted by otto42 at 8:04 PM on December 4, 2014
I suppose you could always hope for a large not-for-profit institution to divert the investor's cash to a 1,000 year project and away from short-term for-profit endeavors.
There is such a thing. It's called "government" and it actually can do a pretty good job, but because the benefit is "general welfare" rather than "profit" this is somehow regarded as less legitimate.
Similarly, in technological development the major hurdle seems to be not that you can't build a better system, but that you can't privatize its benefits.
Basically, capitalism has no use for investments that benefit everyone equally. Which is why, if that's really the best system we can come up with, we are fucked and rightly so.
posted by bjrubble at 12:35 AM on December 5, 2014 [4 favorites]
There is such a thing. It's called "government" and it actually can do a pretty good job, but because the benefit is "general welfare" rather than "profit" this is somehow regarded as less legitimate.
Similarly, in technological development the major hurdle seems to be not that you can't build a better system, but that you can't privatize its benefits.
Basically, capitalism has no use for investments that benefit everyone equally. Which is why, if that's really the best system we can come up with, we are fucked and rightly so.
posted by bjrubble at 12:35 AM on December 5, 2014 [4 favorites]
otto42: “The technological change didn't materialize out of thin air, or come about through decrees and mandates. At some point, some individuals figured out that the oil in Pennsylvania can be harvested more cheaply than harpooning sperm whales.”
No, this is incorrect, and you've been misinformed. The thesis you're referring to – the idea that whale oil stopped being used because of the advance in kerosene manufacture in 1846 – is an idea that was promulgated in the early 1990s such publications as James S Robbins' "How Capitalism Saved The Whales."
But this thesis is roundly contradicted by the facts; that's why most prominent conservatives have abandoned defending it. The advancement in kerosene production in 1846 didn't actually have any impact on the energy markets until the mid-1860s. Whale oil had already been replaced as the predominant cheap oil source. Why was it replaced? Why did prices on whale oil go up? Note that they didn't go up "relative to a few other energy sources" – they went up absolutely. They didn't rise because kerosene became cheaper, as we've already seen. They didn't rise because any other oil got cheaper – that didn't happen; the prices of other oils stayed constant during this period.
The price of whale oil went up because whales were being killed in prodigious numbers, and therefore the supply was being rapidly diminished. There was no check on this killing of prodigious numbers of whales. Capitalism didn't provide one. Government should have.
Would you like to talk about the price of beaver pelts in the middle 1800s next? Maybe your thesis that capitalism saves resources will turn out be correct there...
posted by koeselitz at 9:35 AM on December 5, 2014 [3 favorites]
No, this is incorrect, and you've been misinformed. The thesis you're referring to – the idea that whale oil stopped being used because of the advance in kerosene manufacture in 1846 – is an idea that was promulgated in the early 1990s such publications as James S Robbins' "How Capitalism Saved The Whales."
But this thesis is roundly contradicted by the facts; that's why most prominent conservatives have abandoned defending it. The advancement in kerosene production in 1846 didn't actually have any impact on the energy markets until the mid-1860s. Whale oil had already been replaced as the predominant cheap oil source. Why was it replaced? Why did prices on whale oil go up? Note that they didn't go up "relative to a few other energy sources" – they went up absolutely. They didn't rise because kerosene became cheaper, as we've already seen. They didn't rise because any other oil got cheaper – that didn't happen; the prices of other oils stayed constant during this period.
The price of whale oil went up because whales were being killed in prodigious numbers, and therefore the supply was being rapidly diminished. There was no check on this killing of prodigious numbers of whales. Capitalism didn't provide one. Government should have.
Would you like to talk about the price of beaver pelts in the middle 1800s next? Maybe your thesis that capitalism saves resources will turn out be correct there...
posted by koeselitz at 9:35 AM on December 5, 2014 [3 favorites]
Kevin Street: “People in the developed world didn't stop using whale oil and wood cook stoves because the price of blubber and wood got too high - they upgraded to more efficient, high density energy sources because of technological change.”
Just as a note – this, too, is technically not correct. People in the developed world did stop using whale oil, at least, because the price of blubber got too high. There is no other reason. Whales were being hunted heavily, and the takes dropped precipitously year on year. So the price went up. Meanwhile, the price of kerosene didn't go down (that didn't happen until later) and no other oil source got cheaper.
posted by koeselitz at 9:53 AM on December 5, 2014 [1 favorite]
Just as a note – this, too, is technically not correct. People in the developed world did stop using whale oil, at least, because the price of blubber got too high. There is no other reason. Whales were being hunted heavily, and the takes dropped precipitously year on year. So the price went up. Meanwhile, the price of kerosene didn't go down (that didn't happen until later) and no other oil source got cheaper.
posted by koeselitz at 9:53 AM on December 5, 2014 [1 favorite]
(Also, most whale oil didn't come from sperm whales, but from various baleen whales. Sperm oil was its own thing, as the chart otto42 linked makes clear. Note that sperm oil imports dropped precipitously already before 1845. Why? Because sperm whales were rare enough by then that they weren't worth pursuing for most whalers. Melville actually discusses this in Moby-Dick, as I recall; by the time he was writing, sperm whale hunting was already a dying industry. And it wasn't dying because of the market's demand. It was dying because its principle object was disappearing.)
posted by koeselitz at 10:04 AM on December 5, 2014
posted by koeselitz at 10:04 AM on December 5, 2014
So the answer is Keynesian capitalism controlled by an enlightened technocracy. Place global taxes on carbon, water, meat, and children, and use the proceeds to fund alternative energy. The major roadblock is geopolitcs not necessarily capitalism.
posted by Golden Eternity at 10:09 AM on December 5, 2014
posted by Golden Eternity at 10:09 AM on December 5, 2014
Second Chance Garage"By the 1960s up to 30 million pounds of whale oil were used each year, chiefly as the main additive to automatic transmission and locking differential fluids." It wasn't until the Endangered Species Act in 1973 that alternatives were used.
posted by morganw at 5:32 PM on December 5, 2014
posted by morganw at 5:32 PM on December 5, 2014
Here's What ExxonMobil Thinks About the Future
posted by Golden Eternity at 8:17 PM on December 12, 2014
posted by Golden Eternity at 8:17 PM on December 12, 2014
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Well, seeing that unchecked climate change could very possibly spell the end of humans, then...sure.
posted by Thorzdad at 3:33 PM on December 3, 2014 [15 favorites]