“…while it is easy to point to the counter-qualified, science-denying fanatics Donald Trump is appointing to high office, the war against reality is everywhere. You can see it in the British government’s carbon capture and storage scheme, a new fossil fuel project that will greatly raise emissions but is dressed up as a climate solution…All such approaches are substitutes for action, whose primary purpose is to enable governments to avoid conflict with powerful interests, especially the fossil fuel industry.”
— George Monbiot/The Guardian, Trump’s science-denying fanatics are bad enough. Yet even our climate ‘solutions’ are now the stuff of total delusion. November 21, 2024
A few questions related to the above quote:
What is “action” as it pertains to climate solutions?
What is the evidence that governments are pursuing false climate solutions to appease the fossil fuel industry?
What is the fossil fuel industry doing to scare governments into appeasement?
Why, exactly, is it a bad idea to research the carbon capture and storage (CCS) schemes?
If research is ongoing, how does one know that CCS will greatly raise emissions?
Should we reject any approach to emissions reduction that oil companies back?
Should we reject any approach that allows oil companies to survive?
I actually think the voting public is the most powerful interest group in democracies, much more powerful than a bunch of companies. And right now voters are in no mood to sacrifice their current well-being for the future of the planet - in Europe as well as the U.S. Just a few months ago, green parties suffered dramatic losses in the European parliament elections. And in America, well, Trump won convincingly, and Trump couldn’t give a rat’s ass about the non-human biosphere (except as a provider of “ecological services”).
Climate change and the environment were simply non-factors in this year’s election - no surprise, given that polls have repeatedly documented declining public concern about the environment. For example, in a recent Gallup poll “environmental quality” ranked 12th among issues that Americans worry about, after inflation, crime and violence, hunger and homelessness, the economy, healthcare affordability and availability, federal spending and the budget deficit, illegal immigration, drug use, the Social Security system, the possibility of terrorist attacks, and the availability and affordability of energy. That’s a lot of competition for scarce resources.
Which doesn’t drive me to despair, because the climate outlook may not be as dire as some predict, and we are already making good progress in our ability to mitigate and adapt to climate change. I’ll elaborate in a later post.