Australian drought due to climate change

Originally posted by madamswer: ↑

"Not sure why people really care about the so called Green House Gases ................. India, China and a dozen others are going to pump out more CO2 et al than you can poke a stick at..."

By way of a simple demonstration of that, consider the following numerical reality:

Over the past 2 decades (less, actually; over the past 17 years), total global carbon emissions have risen by 44%, from 25.7bn tonnes in 2000, to 37.1bn tonnes in 2017 (2017 being the latest year that the EU's Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research has collated data for all countries).

In the developed world (i.e., EU, USA, Canada, Australia) total carbon emissions have fallen by 12% (from 11.0bn tonnes in 2000, to 9.7bn tonnes in 2017.)

By comparison, emissions from Developing and Undeveloped countries have risen by a full 86% (no, that's not a typo...it is eighty six percent) from 14.7bn tonnes in 2000 to 27.4bn tonnes in 2017.

Emissions from the Developing world in 2000 were one-third greater than the Developed world.
Less than a decade later, by 2017, they were more than 2.8 times greater.
Today, that proportion is sure to be well over 3 times greater.

And, with per capita carbon emissions in the developing world still only a fraction (about one-tenth) of those in the Developed World, as that per capita figure increases as a consequence of modernisation, industrialisation, and consumption in those countries, at the same time that population in those countries continues to grow, how does any government - which is where you are allocating the responsibility - act in a way to prevent carbon emissions in the developing world from continuing their inexorable rise in the coming decades?

In other words, the nub of the problem is the intractable mathematical reality of:

A large number (aggregate carbon emissions in the developing and undeveloped world) becoming exponentiallylarger (exponential because of the additive effect of rising populations and rising per capita emissions), which is outpacing - at an accelerating rate - a smaller number (aggregate carbon emissions from the developed world) getting linearlysmaller (linearly because the population is remaining largely constant). ?

This dynamic is possibly better represented graphically by the following scenario in which emissions in the developed world are assumed to reduced by a very significant, and unprecedented, 15% pa over the next 3 decades, to end up being a full 90% lower by 2030 and effectively zero by 2040 (the blue line),...

....while emissions growth in the developing world (the black line) is somehow able to be confined to a mere 2%pa (bearing in mind that the compound annual growth rate of emissions from the developed world rose at a rate of 9.3%pa over the last 17 years, so 2% pa is a patently conservative number):

View attachment 1785164

As the red columns in the chart, which are total global carbon emissions, show:

Even if the developed world does amazing job at getting to 90% reduction in emissions by 2030 and zero emissions soon thereafter, it will not stop total global emissions from continuing to rise dramatically (by a full 40% in the scenario considered above).

(And remember, that developing world emission growth figure is assumed at just 2%pa ....which is, effectively, not much different to population growth in the developed world and so does not even account for the inevitable rising per capita emissions as income levels of those regions of the world rise.)

It is really a numbers game and to pretend otherwise is nothing other than duplicitous.

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I am not disputing or disagreeing with any of your numbers madamswer, but let's look at this from a slightly different angle.

Let's say an average family in the developed world lives in a 2-4 bedroom house/apartment, drives one/two cars, owns a washing machine, fridge/freezer, TV, computer, smartphone, electric/gas stove, perhaps even a coffee machine, kettle, etc. and goes on an overseas holiday every "x" years.

In contrast, the average person in the developing world, might until recently have lived in a primitive accommodation in a rural area, but now -seeking a better life for his/her children - found a job in one of the big cities.

In practical terms, if this person from the developing nation buys an apartment, a motorbike, or a fridge/freezer, their emissions will skyrocket compared to when they lived a primitive life on the land. Hence the massive increase in emissions in the developing world.

The way I see things, the main crime of the impoverished people of the developing world is that they aspire to the lifestyle of their developed nation cousins - "us". More so since the Internet has allowed even some of the poorest to see what life in a developed nation looks like.

The reason why the developed world better make a move on getting to zero emissions is not that this will automatically lead to overall zero global emissions - as you numbers quite correctly illustrate. Rather, by the developed world showing that zero emissions are indeed possible - while hopefully maintaining a more or less comfortable lifestyle that it is worth aspiring to - change the goal of the impoverished developing nation citizen.

While in many ways the industrial revolution triggered man-made climate change, technological advancement can assist in reducing man-made emissions. Rather than analysing the climate change predicament via an "us vs them" lens.

We need to start thinking in terms of what strategies have the best chance of ensuring the survival of the species. This is likely to become one of the biggest challenges of mankind. Searching for numerical constructs that excuse us from tackling the problem is not going to be the solution.

imho