Rob Jackson writes:

The NASA scientist James Hansen gave landmark testimony to a US Senate committee in 1988 that brimmed with evidence of climate change. More than 35 years ago, he concluded: ‘The greenhouse effect has been detected, and it is changing our climate now.’ Viewing the climate carnage of 2023 and the lack of action since 1988, Hansen was even stronger: ‘We are damned fools.’

But who is the ‘we’? The top 1 per cent of the world’s population contributes more fossil carbon emissions than half the people on Earth. Climate solutions will require fairer energy use – either at lower levels of consumption than in the US or, if it comes to that, at US levels. But what would the world look like if everyone consumed at that higher rate?

A fifth of the 1.5 billion gasoline-powered vehicles on Earth are in the US, with almost one passenger vehicle per person. Europe has one vehicle for every two people, South America one for five, Asia and Africa one for every seven and 20 people, respectively. If 8 billion people on Earth owned cars at the US rate, the world would have 7 billion vehicles, almost five times the number today. No matter how green those new vehicles might be – electric vehicles (EVs), hydrogen cars or otherwise – adding 5 billion more won’t make the world more sustainable in any way. More electric cars and trucks mean more transmission lines riving the landscape, more lithium mining for batteries, and more spontaneous lithium battery fires. More biomass burning for electricity means more logging, truck trips and wilderness roads. More solar panels mean increasingly large land areas needed for harvesting electrons, less land for biodiversity and natural areas, and more mining of rare metals such as gallium and indium. What’s true for renewables applies equally to fossils, too – more fossil fuel energy means more drilling, mining, spilling, and refining.

Climate solutions start with consuming less. [Continue reading…]