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Which number do you think is larger, the cost for the US to dictate industrialisation policy for the rest of the world or the cost for the US (and possibly other governments more interested in reducing global warming, if the tech is there) to offset some of their emissions?

The problem isn't getting wealthy Californians to swap their SUV for a Tesla, it's getting poor Cubans to give up the only car their government will allow them to afford, cryptoenthusiasts to give up on Bitcoin, Saudi Arabia to decide it doesn't want to exploit its only resource and China to retire its recently constructed coal power plants. That doesn't just require lots of money, it requires magic

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> Which number do you think is larger, the cost for the US to dictate industrialisation policy for the rest of the world or the cost for the US (and possibly other governments more interested in reducing global warming, if the tech is there) to offset some of their emissions?

You only have to dictate policy to them if you're trying to get them to pay for it. If you're going to pay for it yourself, there is nothing at all stopping you from paying people in Africa or South America to buy electric cars. The main thing preventing this is that you would have to convince your taxpayers to pay to offset emissions in some other country. But that's the same problem with carbon capture, except worse, because you would need more dollars to offset the same amount of CO2.

> you would have to convince your taxpayers to pay to offset emissions in some other country

I strangely think the rich world would be more comfortable building carbon capture infrastructure at home than clean energy offshore. The jobs are domestic. And you aren’t handing a productive asset to another country.

Hell, find it with an import tax on polluting countries and we don’t even have to pay for most of it.

The solution to that is to subsidize production of the alternative products in your own country for export. Then subsidized US-made solar panels and electric cars would be cheaper for people in Africa and South America than burning coal, but you get all the US jobs etc.

> subsidized US-made solar panels and electric cars would be cheaper for people in Africa and South America than burning coal, but you get all the US jobs etc.

You're still giving productive infrastructure to foreign countries. A Nazi doormat could get elected running to redirect those panels and subsidies for domestic use.

If you haven't already replaced all of your own fossil fuels, redirecting them to domestic use is fine. If you have, they would have to fight all the people who want to keep their jobs making products for export.

Don't think it's even a strange thought; the US has been always much happier with industrial policy than welfare. "NASA, but for your climate" is a much easier political sell than "let's give foreigners [almost] free luxury goods".

And if you don't want people in the developing world to simply sell the brand new Teslas you've swapped for their 30 year old bangers, you're also going to have to build out a charging infrastructure, ensure that new power stations built to handle the increased electricity demand are renewable, and shut down people's routes to simply buying new ICE cars manufactured in other countries and pocketing the difference between that and the cost of the Tesla. Even assuming that politics doesn't exist and the world will do exactly what the US wants if they spend enough money. the cost of offset doesn't seem quite so expensive after all...

Just as an aside, "NASA, but for your climate" is the coolest idea for a government agency. Big climate moonshots, stuff to inspire people. I love it! I wish it could be so.

>there is nothing at all stopping you from paying people in Africa or South America to buy electric cars

I can think of tons of problems with this.

It requires more scarce than resources like lithium to make cars.

You can be scammed by people selling the car and using that money to buy a house and a cheap commission engine. You don't have the issue with carbon capture.

Your likely to face much more political pushback for subsidizing others carbon use. "Let's make our country carbon neutral" can resonate with people as it's cleaning up after ourselves. That's much easier to convince people to do.

Can Africa and South America even use them? Is it reasonable for them, do they have the infrastructure? I know in some countries electricity can be scarce-- and power companies turn off the supply at night.

It's cheaper to scrub carbon, than it is to fix the societal and economic issues across the globe required to make passing out electric vehicles work

> It requires more scarce than resources like lithium to make cars.

What do you think it takes to capture carbon?

> You can be scammed by people selling the car and using that money to buy a house and a cheap commission engine.

How is that a profitable scam? Anybody else could buy the same car with the same subsidy. You can't resell it for more than you paid.

> Your likely to face much more political pushback for subsidizing others carbon use. "Let's make our country carbon neutral" can resonate with people as it's cleaning up after ourselves.

The only reason to do this is if you've already done that. Otherwise it would make more sense to spend the money subsidizing replacement of fossil fuels in your own country first.

> Can Africa and South America even use them? Is it reasonable for them, do they have the infrastructure? I know in some countries electricity can be scarce-- and power companies turn off the supply at night.

Solar panels and electric cars go together like hand and glove. The car doesn't care what part of the day you charge it, so you charge it when the sun is shining. And you don't need a functioning power grid to install cheap solar on your own house/business.

> How is that a profitable scam? Anybody else could buy the same car with the same subsidy.

What's the subsidy level? Because people earning a few dollars a day aren't paying much more for your subsidised Tesla than they paid for their 30 year old car with an ICE. And if you start subsidising new EVs to the extent that your giving them away for less than $1k, your scheme might actually be worse for the environment (Production costs are a significant fraction of the carbon footprint of a car, especially if it isn't used very much, and directly or indirectly the subsidy makes brand new cars cheap for a lot of people in developed countries that don't need them...)

The more you consider the logistics of such a scheme, the more carbon capture makes sense, and not because I'm averse to the idea of subsidies for EVs or solar manufacture

You don't have to subsidize against the alternative of a 10+ year old car from the US or Europe if you stop selling ICE cars in the US and Europe, because in ten years the ten year old cars will all be electric too.

So the subsidy is only the amount required to make a new electric car cheaper than a new gasoline car, for the people breaking into the middle class who can now afford that. That's the same as it is in the US, isn't very much, and is declining as batteries get cheaper. It may be soon that it won't even be necessary.

Have you ever been to the developing world?

Battered old cars are worth more than a year's average per capita income in much of the world. They're not throwing away recently manufactured US/European/Japanese cars before 2050 just because their country's 0.1% now find subsidised Teslas more financially attractive than Fords or Mercedes. Actually, they probably won't find subsidised Teslas more appealing than Fords or Mercedes if they drive long distances, because it's a lot easy to find a roadside shack with gasoline than EV hookups.

There are already production EVs cheaper than any US manufactured car made in China, but it isn't going to make much of a dent in the residual demand for the billion ICE cars, trucks vans already in existence in places where people buy second hand and maintain forever.

>What do you think it takes to capture carbon?

I'm not familiar with how exactly carbon capture technology works to be honest, but I believe it involves taking advantage of chemistry to separate carbon from air. I don't see how lithium would factor into this as there isn't any absolute need for batteries, as there are with electric cars. Carbon capture at the point of production(ie in factories themselves) could be hooked up to the grid and still have a high rate of capture

>Solar panels and electric cars go together like hand and glove. The car doesn't care what part of the day you charge it, so you charge it when the sun is shining. And you don't need a functioning power grid to install cheap solar on your own house/business.

Enough to charge a car? That's not a simple setup, that takes a serious set up. That effectively increases the cost of running an electric car by a significant margin.

>The only reason to do this is if you've already done that. Otherwise it would make more sense to spend the money subsidizing replacement of fossil fuels in your own country first.

I don't disagree with that. It's the simplest way to start, and represents the most benefit for the taxpayers paying for it.

Us first. The carbon footprint of a US citizen is very high. We can shame others when it gets below average

"Carbon footprint".

Ok -- Empty out the North.

http://www.mappedplanet.com/karten/klima/januar_temp-na.png

How about it? I get to move to Memphis, where I no longer need to heat my dwelling in the Winter.

https://www.chatelaine.com/home-decor/environment-eco-home-h...

I pay 11.3 cents per k/w for electricy

https://www.torontohydro.com/for-home/rates

Natural gas costs 4.71 US/MMBtu

https://www.torontohydro.com/for-home/rates

Now

1 MMBTU = 293.07107 kWh

So with ALL of this, electricity is 7 times more expensive than natural gas.

Now, it costs $125 or so per month to heat a house here - Using electricity, that would be $875. Per month.

https://www.torontohydro.com/about-us/company-overview

Only 6.3% Natural Gas.

In a nutshell, I can't afford it. That's ok, I can just to Memphis for my retirement.

US emissions are ludicrously high per capita but shrinking. The rest of the world's are higher overall and growing.

I'm not sure the mentality that it'd be rude to consider tackling the latter problem unless and until US per capita emissions drop below the global average is going to help the planet.

> We can shame others when it gets below average

This may come as a shock to some, but pretty much nobody outside the US cares what people from the US think about them.

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