George Monbiot throws in the towel

[Bragi]

I can't say as I blame him. As usual, he asks important questions.

As usual, the answer is: because we're too stupid and/or flawed to not be doomed.

Climate change enlightenment was fun while it lasted. But now it's dead
The collapse of the talks at Copenhagen took away all momentum for change and the lobbyists are back in control. So what next?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/sep/20/climate-change-negotiations-failure

[izquierdista]

1. We're not going to get anywhere controlling emissions

The only thing that would effectively control emissions and send the background CO2 levels lower is every one in the developed world living like an Ethiopian subsistence farmer. Even such a grinding halt would take years to show up in reversing climate change, say taking the Arctic Ice Pack back to what it was like a hundred years ago.

I have a better idea. We push carbon sequestration. Don't tax it or cap and trade it, start giving people incentives to sequester it. A lot of the developing world could use biochar as soil amendments. The production and incorporation of large amounts of biochar into the soil would help solve two problems. Besides the obvious solution to the problem of atmospheric carbon, by incorporating a large amount of carbon into the earth in a manner in which it won't volatilize, it will also be a solution to the problems of hunger and poverty in the third world by aiding their farmers.

[Bragi]

2. I'm confident nothing will be done

I'm confident we will end up going way past the point of no return, and in due course, we'll suffer the known consequences -- crop failures, famines, mass migrations, wars, global insecurity, etc. etc., and eventually either species extinction, or at minimum a massive reduction in the number of humans.

I don't see a lot of alternatives.

We're basically screwed because a) turns out we are wired with a very limited ability to make sacrifices now to avoid even catastrophic problems that will occur in the (perceived) distant future, and b) we have established a set of growth-oriented global economic structures that now operate according to their own inherent logic, quite separate from what we may want as individuals, and separate from what the planet can reasonably sustain.

So we're basically out of control and doomed. I'm glad I'm sixty years old, and not twenty or thirty right now. I'll at least not be around for the really bad times coming.

As for you younger folks out there, all I can say is: Gee, sorry about that coming environmental collapse thing.

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. It's not big enough to be a major solution on its own

One estimate for bioenergy crops used for generating energy and biochar, is that about 15 tonnes of carbon per hectare per year could be prevented from entering / removed from the atmosphere. At the global scale, early estimates by the International Biochar Initiative suggest that it is feasible to remove one gigatonne of CO2 (10 to the power of 9 tonnes) by about 2030, which makes it as potentially important as other major carbon mitigation activities (CO2 Capture and Geological Storage (CCS), renewables, efficient vehicles, etc.).

http://randd.defra.gov.uk/Default.aspx?Menu=Menu&Module=More&Location=None&ProjectID=16168&FromSearch=Y&Publisher=1&SearchText=soil&SortString=ProjectCode&SortOrder=Asc&Paging=10#Description

But that - one billion tonnes of CO2 per year - is about a thirtieth of the current world CO2 production: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE67C1IU20100813

It's a partial solution, but, yes, we still need to aim to get our Western CO2 production to be like an Ethiopian farmer.