
Carbon dioxide levels in atmosphere hit record high in May - jonbaer
https://www.noaa.gov/news/carbon-dioxide-levels-in-atmosphere-hit-record-high-in-may
======
tomglynch
I feel like a small fish incapable of making significant difference. I have
reduced my emissions, ride a bike everywhere and am trying to eat mostly plant
based foods. What else can I do?

Is there anyone here on HN that can make a bigger difference - any lawmakers,
anyone connected with lawmakers, any high ups in a large company, any
influencers? It is your obligation to help us - we _need_ you to be our voice.

~~~
natch
The masses of macho guys and Trump voters aren’t converting to bike riding and
veggie eating any time soon.

That’s why Tesla creating eco cars that out-muscle most muscle cars is so
brilliant. It can show people who would never back down from big powerful cars
that their fuel of choice is weak sauce.

I think it will be more effective than appealing to them with carrot juice and
sprouts.

So... my advice is buy/lease a Tesla and show it around. At the very least
you’ll have fun.

~~~
waingake
Nope. It should be prohibitively expensive to own any other car but an
electric car. Because the externalized costs of carbon should be fully
reconciled in the price of fuel. With the extra tax revenue here, a government
could subsidize electric vehicles.

If your fix is waiting on people ( that are wealthy enough ) to choose an
electric car over a gasoline car so they feel good about themselves we aren't
going to get where we need to be in time.

The economically viable thing to do, needs to be the right thing to do. This
is a place for regulation, not the free fucking market.

~~~
wonnage
This won't work, because it means all the people who don't have money to buy a
new car are now subject to your psychotic fuel tax. Your solution winds up
being much more regressive than Tesla making rich people cars.

~~~
jogjayr
Or they might start living denser, walking and biking more, using and
supporting public transport, like the rest of the world's lower-earning
people. People adapt to the circumstances in front of them.

------
josho
“the rate of increase is accelerating”. I was under the impression that we
were reducing emissions. It’s terrifying that the progress combating climate
change is nothing more than lip service.

~~~
Fishkins
I think people in developed countries are reducing their per capita emissions
a bit. However, population is still increasing, and people in many countries
are increasing their (material) standard of living in a way that increases
emissions.

------
derp_dee_derp
Sigh

When will we learn?

I think the answer is incentives. Ideas?

~~~
mac01021
There is a bill in the US House of representatives[1] that is _exactly_ the
right idea, but it doesn't have nearly enough support at the moment.

1\. The state charges a fee to emit greenhouse gases.

2\. The proceeds of that fee are divided equally amongst all residents of the
nation in the form of a monthly check.

3\. The actual bill imposes the fee upstream where the fuel is produced rather
than where it is burnt, and imposes border adjustments to prevent outsourcing
of emissions to other nations, but I don't want to get into all of that in
this post.

4\. It's a reasonably short bill[2]. You could probably read and understand
every word in an hour.

You can look at this as a two-sided incentive - if you emit less than average,
your dividend will be bigger than the fee that you pay and so you get extra
spending money. If you emit more than average, then your fee is higher and you
come out in the red. Some economic modeling dudes predict this incentive will
cause the USA to emit 40% less within 12 years after the policy is
implemented, but I honestly have no idea how reliable that prediction is.

However, while that incentive is great and probably exactly what we need, this
policy would be the right, just thing to do _even if it were not going to move
the needle on our emissions rates_.

The reason is that, every time [insert your favorite celebrity or business
tycoon here] crosses the country in a private jet, they do a little damage to
my future and my daughter's. They should reimburse us, and reimburse everyone
else they're harming. When I decide to keep my 3000-square-foot house at 70F
all through the New England winter, I'm harming your future and those of
everyone you love. I should reimburse you.

This policy doesn't place hard limits on any kind of activity or consumption.
But any time you're externalizing the cost of your emissions onto society at
large, you have to compensate society for the damage.

[1][https://energyinnovationact.org/how-it-
works/](https://energyinnovationact.org/how-it-works/)

[2][https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-
bill/763/...](https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-
bill/763/text)

------
rdm_blackhole
The Earth's population keeps on increasing yet we are now facing the most
prominent threat to us as a species.

This cannot go on forever if we don't start putting a maximum cap on our
population, then we are heading for a disaster and the Earth itself is going
to start doing what we have refused to do so so far.

Except that the reduction of our population will happen through heatwaves,
pandemics, droughts...

Then what?

~~~
rexpop
> the reduction of our population

What a dangerous idea.

Besides, it's not the issue of absolute population: it's emissions _per
capita_ that we should care about.

We could be doing a lot better _per capita_ in these dimensions: \- plastics &
packaging, \- energy use, \- military pollution, \- advertising & marketing
bullshit, \- bullshit products manufacturing

There's a lot of inefficiency in current economy, which is supported by
industrial consent manufacturing.

~~~
vraid
The atmosphere doesn't care how much or little we emit per capita. Total
emissions is what should worry us.

~~~
rexpop
You do realize that total emissions are a function of emissions per capita,
yes?

~~~
vraid
The reason we care about emissions is due to their effect on the atmosphere,
of which there is one.

We don't get a free pass to emit more as our population increases. The
atmosphere doesn't magically adjust. The effect of emissions on the climate is
invariant of our population, and we need to act accordingly.

~~~
rexpop
This environmental journalist has a better grasp on the argument:
[https://www.vox.com/energy-and-
environment/2017/9/26/1635652...](https://www.vox.com/energy-and-
environment/2017/9/26/16356524/the-population-question)

------
nonbel
One thing that bugs me is they measure CO2 levels in ppm instead of moles/m^3
(or whatever would be appropriate). Why is the denominator assumed constant?
Why can't nitrogen, oxygen, argon, water vapor, etc be changing too?

In fact people have been extracting N2 from the atmosphere at scale for ~120
years:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process)

And apparently O2 has been depleting as well:
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5138252/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5138252/)

We are at the point where gradeschoolers are questioning why the tables of
atmospheric constituents don't add up to 100%:

> _Two recent reliable sources cited here have total atmospheric compositions,
> including trace molecules, that exceed 100%. They are Allen 's Astrophysical
> Quantities[5] (2000, 100.001241343%) and CRC Handbook of Chemistry and
> Physics[4] (2016–2017, 100.004667%), which cites Allen's Astrophysical
> Quantities. Both are used as references in this article. Both exceed 100%
> because their CO2 values were increased to 345 ppmv, without changing their
> other constituents to compensate. This is made worse by the April 2019 CO 2
> value, which is 413.32 ppmv._
> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Earth#cite_note-...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Earth#cite_note-
> total%-8)

~~~
gregallan
If you're saying that moles/m^3 of CO2 might be constant while pmm of CO2 is
increasing, that implies that atmospheric pressure at sea level is dropping.
And it isn't.

~~~
rabidrat
The temperature is increasing, though...

~~~
yongjik
"Atmospheric pressure" is basically "total mass of air on top of us, per
surface area". So it doesn't (directly) depend on temperature.

Edit: Sorry, should be "total _weight_ of air". My physics is rusty.

~~~
nonbel
If you took the same mass of air and put it in two tropospheres, one is 2 km
high and the other 20 km high. Would there be the same surface pressure?

~~~
yongjik
You cannot put air at 2 km and then at 20 km high! Of course the second layer
will just flow down until it's supported by the first layer, which is in turn
supported by the ground. So your question doesn't really make physical sense.

~~~
nonbel
I agree, everything is much more complicated than your original comment
implied.

~~~
yongjik
I... I just explained why everything adds up to what my original comment
said... (sigh)

------
anigbrowl
I posted this the other day and nobody was interested but it seems relevant
here:
[https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/148cb0_b2c0c79dc4344b279bcf23...](https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/148cb0_b2c0c79dc4344b279bcf2365336ff23b.pdf)

------
b_tterc_p
Normalized to seasonality and adjusting for uncommon events like volcanoes,
shouldn’t this happen all the time?

~~~
burke
I’m honestly curious how one could think this would happen “all the time” in
any sort of measurement scheme without things having gone wrong as a
prerequisite.

~~~
b_tterc_p
I don’t know why you assumed I thought nothing was wrong with this. It’s
obviously a bad thing.

I’m genuinely asking if total carbon dioxide levels are monotonically
increasing normalized to the things I mentioned. Wouldn’t you be surprised if
next May there is less CO2 in the atmosphere barring massive societal change?

------
surge
How much of it is actually us though? I thought most of our emissions are
going down overall its overseas developing countries with few if any
regulations and little enforcement of the ones that do exist causing most of
it? WTH can we do about it?

All we can do is plant trees.

~~~
labster
Logic like this leads to no one addressing the problem, ever. Buy local
products that use less energy to transport. Reduce, reuse, recycle -- in that
order. Pay for energy efficiency. Lobby your government. Stop blaming other
people when you are part of the problem too.

~~~
surge
What if I'm already doing that, and the CO2 emissions are still going up every
year?

What if the feedback loop is causing a run away effect?

I feel as an individual, mostly helpless. You say buy local but most of the
things your suggesting actually cost more (like buying local and becoming
vegetarian).

~~~
labster
> What if I'm already doing that

You're not.

> What if the feedback loop is causing a run away effect?

It's not. I'm an atmospheric scientist.

> You say buy local but most of the things your suggesting actually cost more

They don't actually cost more. You're just paying the price now, instead of
making humanity pay it later in damages.

> (like buying local and becoming vegetarian)

I did not suggest becoming vegetarian. I would have suggested suicide way
before I suggested vegetarianism.

In summary, whataboutism isn't the answer to climate change.

