Simple questions: Is less air pollution better or not? Is less noisy traffic better or not? Of course one can endlessly nit-pick and lament about all the things going wrong in the energy transition, and there are certainly larger issues that need to be raised and those responsible be politically crucified.
But the underlying principle is simple truth: Arguably we are still in the period of warming after the last ice age, pre-existing, the trend having nothing to do with us. But we did manage to speed it up substantially and thereby deny our and other species adaptation, if any. If we were able to slow the warming ever so little, it would be advantageous.
The comparatively short Paris Agreement features the term Sustainable Development more than a dozen times. Of course this was a spin to imply "sustainable growth" without expressly saying so, nonetheless signatories read it as such, else most of them would certainly not have signed. This sustainable development (=growth) spin is in complete denial of the fact that actually only substantially reduced consumption resulting in zero and/or negative global economic growth is likely to make a dent in global warming.
However, we have no economic model that works at zero or negative growth, also the infinitely wise, infallible and utterly divine Communists do not have a zero growth model to offer.
Doing something is better than doing nothing. Consensus has been reached on doing something. So, we have got to go with the cynical spin of sustainable development and swap drilling for fossil fuels for mining of nonferrous metals. Perhaps it will have a positive impact, other than introducing exciting new technologies. Perhaps it doesn't, but then we have at least tried.
Oh absolutely and consequently our countries will end up like Cuba or 1980s New Zealand (they bizarrely had massive tariffs on car imports when they never had a car industry to protect) all driving ancient carefully maintained vehicles with cottage industries springing up to maintain them. Or they get round that by driving people off the road with MOT requirements?
Simple questions: Is less air pollution better or not? Is less noisy traffic better or not? Of course one can endlessly nit-pick and lament about all the things going wrong in the energy transition, and there are certainly larger issues that need to be raised and those responsible be politically crucified.
But the underlying principle is simple truth: Arguably we are still in the period of warming after the last ice age, pre-existing, the trend having nothing to do with us. But we did manage to speed it up substantially and thereby deny our and other species adaptation, if any. If we were able to slow the warming ever so little, it would be advantageous.
The comparatively short Paris Agreement features the term Sustainable Development more than a dozen times. Of course this was a spin to imply "sustainable growth" without expressly saying so, nonetheless signatories read it as such, else most of them would certainly not have signed. This sustainable development (=growth) spin is in complete denial of the fact that actually only substantially reduced consumption resulting in zero and/or negative global economic growth is likely to make a dent in global warming.
However, we have no economic model that works at zero or negative growth, also the infinitely wise, infallible and utterly divine Communists do not have a zero growth model to offer.
Doing something is better than doing nothing. Consensus has been reached on doing something. So, we have got to go with the cynical spin of sustainable development and swap drilling for fossil fuels for mining of nonferrous metals. Perhaps it will have a positive impact, other than introducing exciting new technologies. Perhaps it doesn't, but then we have at least tried.
Oh... and Ford
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/07/24/ford-motor-f-earnings-q2-2024.html
Also Porsche and Tesla.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/07/23/porsche-scraps-electric-car-targets-amid-demand-slump/
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/23/business/tesla-q2-earnings-elon-musk.html
Oh absolutely and consequently our countries will end up like Cuba or 1980s New Zealand (they bizarrely had massive tariffs on car imports when they never had a car industry to protect) all driving ancient carefully maintained vehicles with cottage industries springing up to maintain them. Or they get round that by driving people off the road with MOT requirements?
Or banning the sale of petrol and diesel? Or making the excise duty on them truly punitive?