Renewable technologies are gathering speed, putting the world within reach of falling greenhouse gas emissions. Climate experts say they "struggle to wrap their heads around" the sheer size, scale and speed of the current transition.
One should not forget that all these things are not produced and manufactured with zero emissions.
EV batteries still need huge amounts of CO2 emissions, photovoltaic cells are far from zero emissions and with the huge amounts of untapped potential to make existing stuff emitt less CO2, there will still be a lot of growth in emissions…
And once emissions begin showing a downward-facing curve, indicating decreasing emissions, I will begin to be hopeful.
But when emissions are still curving strongly upward, with no hint of even a straight trend line (indicating that emissions growth has halted), I continue to be brutally and hyper-realistically pessimistic.
One should not forget that all these things are not produced and manufactured with zero emissions. EV batteries still need huge amounts of CO2 emissions, photovoltaic cells are far from zero emissions and with the huge amounts of untapped potential to make existing stuff emitt less CO2, there will still be a lot of growth in emissions…
And once emissions begin showing a downward-facing curve, indicating decreasing emissions, I will begin to be hopeful.
But when emissions are still curving strongly upward, with no hint of even a straight trend line (indicating that emissions growth has halted), I continue to be brutally and hyper-realistically pessimistic.