Which places in particular? Here in the middle east temperatures regularly get up to 45-50 degrees celsius in the summer and people get by okay. Most places have average temperatures much lower than that, so how would a rise of just 3-4 degress make then uninhabitable?
Bangladesh alone is +170M people. Dispacing these people will be a refugee crisis on an unseen scale.
The issue isn't all thermometers going up by 3.5 degC. The issue is that it also brings a host of other changes, and it's those things that kill you. They include:
- higher variability of temperatures. So your +3.5 degC actually makes heatwaves of +10/+15 more likely
- changing rainfall patterns, taking rain away from some places that rely on it.
- rising sea level, where the small average temperature changes are sufficient for a significant increase.
I actually think the focus on global average temperature increase is a major failure of public science communication, precisely because everyone mentally adds the increase to their local climate and thinks "meh".
Largely because the 45-50 degree temperature do not last very long. And partly because AC loss due to prolonged blackouts has not happened during such heat - yet.
A 3-4 degree increase in average temperature means that 45-50 degree temperature periods may go from lasting 1-3 days to 2-3 weeks. And that's a whole new ball game.
Another thing noted is that urban features such as green spaces, water features, and increased shade may work where exceedance is typically nonhumid (i.e., North America, Middle East, Australia), these factors may not be as effective or even actively detrimental in more humid environments due to the added humidity.
Everything can be seen from space...
23 years ago, climate scientists were predicting that, "snowfall will become "a very rare and exciting event" and that "Children just aren't going to know what snow is" [1], in Britain.
In 2008, James Hansen, an influential climate scientist at Columbia predicted the Arctic would be ice free in the summer by 2018 [3]. Instead, the sea ice trend reversed in 2012 and since rebounded to higher levels than when Hansen made the prediction [4].
Furthermore, the predictions of dire consequences as a result of CO2 increase or mild warming have not materialized. Instead global biomass has dramatically increased and crop yields continue to achieve record highs, which is what you would predict as a result of increased plant growth from CO2 fertilization [2].
[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20150912124604/http:/www.indepen...
[2] https://www.nasa.gov/technology/carbon-dioxide-fertilization...
[3] https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1988&dat=20080624&id=...
[4] https://earth.gsfc.nasa.gov/cryo/data/current-state-sea-ice-...
[5] https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/climate-model-projecti...
1. Flaring isn't efficient. You only burn about 90% of the gas, the rest leaks into the atmosphere.
2. Gas includes Methane. Methane is a 10x more powerful greenhouse gas than CO2, though it lasts considerably less long (about 10y i believe).
This means that a single well flaring methane is emitting just as much as 10 wells just releasing co2 into the air. To combat this, we need to install an internal combustion engine attached to something to bleed the energy generated by the engine into something else.
Traditionally, this is not something affordable. There is a significant upfront cost, and very few solutions to use the energy, as most of these installations are far removed from the grid.
Luckily, there is a new solution that can make this a profitable situation for everyone. It is rapidly seeing more interest, and it is even powering a system that can benefit everyone in the world: Bitcoin mining.
Bitcoin mining requires cheap, dependable energy. It doesn't require a grid connection, and adding a satellite connection is enough to start mining. You can drive a single container full of mining ASICs onsite, and maintenance is mostly possible off-site.
You could do the same analysis for wind turbines that don't turn, solar panels that don't sol. What we do know is that natural gas beats the shit out of coal on every measure climate bros claim to care about and it doesn't require digging up half the world's minerals to waste on early-stage renewable technology that is almost certain to require far less cobalt and God-knows-what else when the technology matures.
More meetings and deliberations