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Comment by ppf | Hacker News Reader

> Coal, oil and gas need to stay in the ground. People around the world are demanding climate justice

I look forward to seeing an EV battery manufactured entirely using renewable energy, instead of the current situation where developing countries burn huge amounts of brown coal to power their manufacture.

In my opinion, this is just mandated destruction of Western industry, and completely meaningless until we demand that all of the energy-intensive products we import from developing countries are also not made using fossil fuels.

Edit: Strange response. Where am I incorrect?

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It's absolutely meaningless. It's a sick joke. China recently overtook the entire developed world combined in greenhouse gas emissions [1] and their output is still set to keep climbing for decades yet. Very soon they'll be at three times the emissions of the US. And meanwhile they're building new coal power plants as fast as they can put them up.

None of this Shell type stuff matters. Not one bit. It's fake, laughable green theater until you stop the extreme and growing emissions output coming from China (which isn't going to happen under any circumstances and everyone knows it). It's a bunch of childish rich people in the developed world virtue signaling while the planet burns down regardless because their actions don't amount to mattering what-so-ever back in reality. Let's see the EU stand up to China and start shutting down their trade with China until they reverse on emissions; right, nobody, absolutely nobody, dares to even discuss such actions. Which is another way of saying they have no intention of actually ever doing anything about climate change.

And that fact of reality is the one the green virtue signaling crowd is too cowardly to ever face up to. They run away or try to shout you down if you point out the reality of the situation: you can now take emissions to zero in the developed world and it won't matter at all unless you stop China's runaway output. And that's before Africa adds another billion people in the coming decades and seeks a similar pattern of development (again, the green theater is all a bullshit fraud unless the plan is to stop all of this development across the board immediately, otherwise none of it matters).

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-57018837

Yep - just looking at the reception my comment has recieved, you are absolutely correct about "running away or shouting down".

It's not just "China is burning coal", it's "China is burning coal to make all the crap we want/need and buy from them".

> China recently overtook the entire developed world combined in greenhouse gas emissions [1] and their output is still set to keep climbing for decades yet. Very soon they'll be at three times the emissions of the US.

Is that meant to be some sort of argument against reducing emissions? If the US managed to reach zero-emissions ahead of China, then China would be releasing infinity times more greenhouse gasses than the US! Is this meant to be some sort of argument against decarbonising, since all it tells me is that even more needs to be done.

> you can now take emissions to zero in the developed world and it won't matter at all unless you stop China's runaway output. And that's before Africa adds another billion people in the coming decades and seeks a similar pattern of development (again, the green theater is all a bullshit fraud unless the plan is to stop all of this development across the board immediately, otherwise none of it matters).

Why do you think "the developed world" isn't zero emissions already? I'll give you a clue: it's the same reason countries like China continue to build up their fossil fuel infrastructure (alongside some of the largest rollouts of nuclear and renewable energy, I might add!)

It's because we, as a species, don't have the technology and manufacturing throughput to easily switch over completely to renewables (although we can get pretty far already, and should not wait if there are existing solutions). That needs a lot more investment, in time and money. That is simply unafforable to many developing countries, who need to lift their populations out of poverty right now.

Many developed countries do have the time and money; their populations aren't dying off from preventable diseases, so they can afford to invest heavily in this tech. Once we do have sufficient technology and manufacturing capability, it can be sold to the developing world. It's a sound business investment, but the startup capital is simply too high for many countries like those in Africa to cover. (Note that China is a huge investor in technology and manufacturing too)

The relative emissions of China and the developed world are linked. Every time we mandate some new energy-intensive technology (eg, EVs, solar, etc), and also ban the methods of manufacture in the developed world, it's China that gladly digs up some more brown coal and makes the stuff for us.

Until we also mandate the complete CO2 lifecycle of all the products we import, this is a completely meaningless move (by the Dutch court). Saying that we are currently "switching over to renewables", while ignoring exactly how that is happening (that is, by importing everything, with the aforementioned issues), is just self-delusional.

When you wage a war you take any wins you can. You fight for every corner and every street.

Western policies create a forcing function on the technology development.

We need to make products so good that they win even without climate emergency.

Tesla is a perfect example of that. Solar energy soon will also be simply better than any fossil fuels.

It is also important to have your own stuff together when demanding the same from others.

And if China will not be meeting its targets I see no reason to not impose import taxes on China.

We could monitor China emissions from space and tax accordingly.

Why would we tax imports from China, when they make 90% of our solar modules?

That's a hypothetical. If:

a) We will keep on meeting our emission targets

b) China will keep on missing their emission targets

then it does not make sense to import anything from China.

My guess is that CCP is quite serious about climate change and will attempt to fulfill it's obligations.

They are already slipping by targeting carbon neutrality in 2060 vs. 2050.

But we are not doing enough either.

How is it a hypothetical? You've already said that China has slipped on its carbon neutrality goals, all while we continue to import ever more manufactured goods from that country. Now would be the time to start taxing those, which as I pointed out, we would never do.

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