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Comment by sfn42 | Hacker News Reader

The ecosystem absolutely is being destroyed. We're looking at anywhere from 3-5C warming by 2060, which is going to be devastating if not flat out apocalyptic. And wherever we're at in 2060 it's not like it's going to stop there, nor is it going to be comfortable until then. Things may start to crumble much sooner.

I don't believe AI and data centers have played that much of a role in this though, we could have powered those without burning billions of tons of coal and gas etc, and im sure there's already a significant fraction of green energy powering then depending on location. Anyway we would have been roughly in the same spot right now with or without AI and some new data centers. The media just loves spinning the narrative to make the hordes of sheep scream about anything other than the real issues.

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We're not even looking at 5C of warming by 2100 realistically. Like, that was considered to be an unlikely extreme scenario in 2014 AR5, and also in the tightened down 2021 AR6, and things have happened since! Renewables are cheaper than ever, and Ukrainian war and Iranian war both curbed the appetite for long term fossil fuel power investment.

The median is what, a bit under 3C by 2100? Not even by 2060 - by 2100. And we're in 2026, so that's more than twice as slow as your expectation.

Agreed on AI not being a meaningful factor in climate change though. We'd have to go full "humankind is obsolete" technological singularity to have AI dominate energy use to this extent, and current numbers are nowhere near that. It's a FUD distraction from the real culprits: the fossil fuel energy complex. That's currently lobbying to slow the inevitable energy transition.

> that was considered to be an unlikely extreme scenario

By the same people who just realized we're missing 1.5C as we're blazing past it at mach 12, still accelerating not slowing down? You really believe those guys?

You have to understand that there are several camps of climate science. The mainstream ones like IPCC and UN etc are heavily politicized, they can't publish anything that isn't sugarcoated beyond recognition. At least I assume that's why they're so obviously wrong.

Here's a judgement I think is more realistic

> There is a strong probability that the ambition gap will lead to a temperature rise of 2 to 5 degrees Centigrade compared to pre-industrial temperatures by 2100, the realisation gap to a further rise of several degrees Centigrade.[1,2,VI] There is a danger that the mean temperature will already have risen by 3 degrees Centigrade by 2050.

https://www.dpg-physik.de/veroeffentlichungen/publikationen/...

Yes, I do. IPCC's reports are sensible. They're not unreliable just because they don't support the "doom and burning land" narratives.

By the way, there is no "just realized we're missing 1.5C". That projection was always the very low end of possibilities - the "assume rapid, radical climate action on global level" scenario.

Yes, that's a dumb thing to assume. We've never been on track for it. But the "assume extremely high emissions and no green transition ever, 5C+ by 2100" scenario on the other end is about as unlikely to materialize. Those are the boundaries of the expectation range - not median expectations.

I'm pessimistic. We're still producing more CO2 each year than the last, and several feedback loops are kicking in that accelerate the warming further such as permafrost thawing, arctic and antarctic sea ice disappearing, glaciers are melting, the amazon is being demolished, etc. I don't know how much of this is included in the projections.

I hope the optimists are right, it just doesn't look like it to me at all. It looks to me like we're speeding along right into the worst predictions and beyond. We're building lots of green energy production but it seems to just come in on top of existing and new fossil production not replace it.

It does seem like the CO2 output is plateauing which is good, but we really need it to start declining drastically very soon and I don't really see that happening with the current political climate. Also remember CO2 is far from the only greenhouse gas - methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gas emissions all seem to be rising rapidly still.

As a rule: feedback loops are overrated.

They are, in fact, included in the projections - we'd be on track to ~2C by 2100 instead of ~3C by 2100 if they weren't. They just aren't that big.

There is no "Make Earth Into Venus Feedback Loop Of Doom" that a lot of people seem to imagine when they hear "feedback loop". There is, however, a dozen of things that add about +5% each.

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