Okay done. Now that I have eliminated this here my contribution to CO2 emissions, what do we do about the 100 companies that cause 70% of global CO2 emissions? Or is that no longer an issue once my car is taken out of circulation?
Transportation is a quarter of global emissions, with passenger vehicles making up half of that number and is only getting larger as more people in the world decide they need a car.
The number you’re looking for is 20 companies making up 30% of emissions. They’re almost exclusively oil companies, with more than half of them being state owned enterprises. Reduce the need for oil and you reduce the amount they pollute.
So, how do you do that?
Personal vehicles are the most flexible in terms of emissions. Increasing the usability of public transportation has a direct correlation with the number of vehicles on the road. Sure, people out in the middle of nowhere need a vehicle and nobody is looking to take that from them, but you could HALF the number of people in the US with a car if cities had proper public transport or were as walkable as they were barely 80 years ago.
The private sector is more difficult. We’d need to rebuild our train infrastructure that has been gutted and raided by our rail companies in order to get trucks off the interstate. Coincidentally, that would get MORE people off the road since you wouldn’t need a car to go between cities.
Additionally, you seem to be under the impression that we’re incapable of solving multiple problems at the same time. We can make cars unnecessarily (not GET RID of them) while also cutting emissions in other areas.
Make no mistake, we do need to address other areas, but cars are an easy target that would reduce tons of emissions and increase people’s quality of life as well. Cars are a massive waste of space and a huge ongoing drain on taxpayer dollars for very little benefit when you compare it to the alternatives.
I am not saying that we are incapable of solving multiple problems at once, I am saying that we are incapable of solving the main problem.
I was not joking when I said that my car is not a factor. My individual part in this regard is done. But the point remains that by considering the main sources of pollution too “inflexible” to tackle, it seems that we are debating about which colour to best repaint a sinking ship here while being utterly, completely powerless to address the big hole in the hull.
So in conclusion, I’ll now pat myself on the back for having done my part while sailing this doomed (but [for some at least] highly profitable) planet to hell in a handbasket.
I am saying that we are incapable of solving the main problem.
Has to be done via government. Government action is how to address many industrial practices.
But also, when you say “70% by industry”, that ignores that industry is producing stuff for us. They don’t exist without a consumer.
I mean… they’re making things for us generally. I don’t think they’re emitting recreationally. Look at a pie chart of total emissions and figure what you could cut to hit 50%. Do away with all transportation… Boats planes etc and you’re not even close.
If the average person cut out 100% of their carbon emissions for the rest on their life, they’d save, on average, the amount of CO2 that industry creates in ~1 second. Our personal emissions are but a drop in the ocean in the grand scheme. Change is best brought about by voting both metaphocally with our wallets and literally with our ballot papers.
The industries produces CO2 to provide us goods and services. Car is one of them; not using a car, not only I don’t produce gazes directly (or less), but I also don’t use something “the industry” produced CO2 for.
Why is industry creating carbon? They’re building the things we need and generating our power. Probably 100% of industrial CO2 emissions are conducted for us. This is just our emissions upstream from the things we consume directly.
Also if you cut 100% of your emissions you’d be dead. Breathing emits CO2.
While we’re in cycles, the elites are riding in their luxurious car, and flying in their private jets producing all the emissions the world needs.
Yet! We have to deprive ourselves from vehicles, and they be enjoying life.
Private aviation is basically nothing in terms of emissions. Is pretty gross though.
Can you please support your statement with a reference to the source of that data?
https://ourworldindata.org/emissions-by-sector
All aviation is 1.9% … Private would be a vanishingly small amount of that.
But now you can ride around on your high horse and look at all the scum ruining our planet with their cars.
We are never gonna have a chance against climate change if we try to plead to the individual to live a “greener” life.
Which companies are those? Coca Cola, who make your drinks that you drink? Ford, who make the car you drive? One of the oil companies who fuels your car? A company that makes the clothes you wear?
It all comes down to consumers in the end - we are the end point of the chain and these mythical 100 companies exist for us. Stop ducking the issue.
Ok, so give us your plan to stop billions of people from buying cars, clothes and cola.
I, personally, would love to hear it.
As a consumer, i cant find ways to make the products i buy cause less environmental damage and i cant just stop buying clothes, and theres only one place to buy them
or food. And i can only get that from one place.
I cant suddenly not own a car, or else how do i get to work? Public transport isnt an option where i live. and i dont have a choice in how that car is made.
There are alternatives out there for all of these but they are significantly more expensive and i already live on a tight budget and cant afford to suddenly increase my spending.
If you cant see how that traps consumers and the change has to come from above then you are lost
Also theres nothing ‘mythical’ about the companies that produce 70% of the emmisions.
Thats not even the point of the argument. We are expected to separate our waste into special bins or buy electric cars (soooo expensive) or produce less waste and reduce our individual emmisions but its pointless. we can only affect 30% of the global emissions and ee wont get our individual emmisions to zero so it wont even be 30% reduced if we make all the changes we need to.
This isnt an us or them situation, companies need to be held accountable for their emissions and be forced to reduce them. They will always follow the money, consumers will get used to whatever options they are given.
Just like all other environmental legislation Chinese imports will just fill the void. They use mostly coal.
What if alternatives for heavy emitters like steel and concrete producers do not exist at this time… Just dictating targets might be unproductive.
Companies emissions are exclusively to provide you the consume with goods and services. Companies will respond to the marker dictated by the consumer. Really we are also driving the 70%…
Companies will respond to the marker dictated by the consumer.
This is a lie that you’ve been told by econ 101. Companies will manipulate the markets through lobbying and anticompetitive behaviours so that the consumer has no other choice.
For instance, the suburbs are not a natural outworking of market desires, they are mandated by legislation that prevents medium rise and high density urban development, which necessitates cars and also massively overloads the roads so you have terrible traffic.
This wasn’t a natural outworking of a market, but a deliberate push by capitalists to destroy public transit, build more roads, and lock you the consumer into a world in which you actually do not have any choice. This, not coincidentally, also creates the most wasteful possible way to organise our cities and transport ourselves - individualised cars and dwellings with enormous demands on space. More wasteful systems are as a rule better for capitalists because they create the largest possible market for consumables and redundant equipment.
Yeah if you want to fix zoning to increase density that’s a local government issue. I personally like having a car and large house outside of the city. I’m absolutely in support of government fixing multi residential zoning … Would have loved better options when I was younger. I’m sure a lot of developers would gladly respond to those market forces if given the option … Do you think it’s nimbys preventing that or capitalists?
We live under capitalism. That means, explicitly, that capital has all the power. To the extent nimbyism is a real problem that’s because it’s been stoked by capitalist propaganda and fueled by the artificial fear that their property prices will go down. Homeowners have been taught to think in those terms rather than about what will actually affect their quality of life because the nuance-flattening logic of the market permeates our thinking.
You show me a single home owner who’s enthusiastic about having a large multi-unit built next door … I wouldn’t be happy personally.
If you think capital has all the power look at TC energy’s keystone pipeline. Look at LNG facility approval in Canada. No shortage of capital there but those projects are dead.
If there’s demand for something (housing) markets will solve that problem you just get out of the way and let them. Capitalists would love to sell the same acre of developed realeatate to more than one person. Remember - they’re greedy.
How bout making government accountable for the people instead of relying on a state machine that consistently needing funds from the lobbying? We have to utilise our collective power to enforce our will onto the goverment, isn’t that how democracy works? Sure it is hardly significant for one’s contribution to the emission reduction, but we still have to voice out our concern on the matters. This particular post is one of such effort. There’s no shame on doubting OP on pushing their voice on the issue, but this community is dedicated for such problem, of course you’d expect post like this to raise the awareness.
You’re both right. We need massive systemic change, but that’s not an excuse to not do what you can in your own life. It’s really easy to get disillusioned (hell, I am half the time) but defeatism gets us nowhere.
sort of, but also not. Sure, those companies are funded by us, but they lobby governments and shit so we NEED to buy their stuff. I wouldn’t think GM would be such a big company if they didn’t get rid of all the streetcars for example
We should really be investing more in public transit, it’s way better than electric cars and could be way more convenient if implemented properly
Design a city around electric wheelchairs and you’ll have a system accessible to everyone.
Conveyor belts everywhere ♥️ no need for electric wheelchairs.
Dunno of you’re being sardonic, but that would actually be smart.
Go start a public transport company. If you’re right the market will reward you :)
That’s not really how that works.
When it comes to public transportation, they rarely pull a profit on their own. What they do is drive the economy in the places they go, make a city more accessible to everyone (further driving the economy), and cut costs for the city in other places. They’re a loss leader to save money and improve quality of life in a multitude of other areas by huge margins.
Everything is profitable if you raise prices. In a way you’re just offsetting a certain segment of the populations transportation costs to everyone else under that system. Maybe you could privatize the roads too and use the tolls to fund more buses which operate at a profit. Its fun think of insane libertarian free marker solutions to such problems :) Cars might be less appealing if people had to pay the associated infrastructure costs on a per km basis.
Im just gonna ignore the overall stupidity of going “The market will solve it” and instead point out the fact that a public transit company would almost definitionally be under the umbrella of the government. Private transit company is the term youre looking for.
Market forces don’t work for every industry. Car transportation included, think how roads exist.
Question. How did they move that sign there?
The comments on this post are such a joke. The name of the community is literally ‘fuck cars’ and people are getting bent out of shape because we’re posting about our dislike of cars.
I like cars. They’re comfortable and convenient.
i like turtles
I like trains. They’re comfortable and convenient.
I like trains too. Unfortunately they rarely go anywhere I need to go where I live. In Toronto they also sadly win out in the homeless urine category over my car.
I like most trains, but fuck that one I took up to Washington. I was on that thing for 36 hours and my ass started chafing 5 hours in, admitedly I think that train was built when Nixon was president and last updated under when Clinton was president.
You can like cars, go ahead. What I don’t like is that I’m forced to have one to complete each and every task outside of my house. I am forced to have and use a car for everything. I WANT to take a quick walk to a shop for milk, not take a 15 minute drive to a big box store, a seven minute walk across its ridiculous parking lot, then do it all again in reverse. Why am I forced to have a car each and every day without fail in order to survive?
If you really want to you can structure your life in a way where food is close to home… did that through college. Paid for cabs for groceries … Walked and used transit or my bike. Was pretty miserable in Canadian winters and not very convienent. Plus pretty expensive… You can do it. Or just admit you like cars :) as long as most people secretly actually like cars and use them then society will be structured in a way to accommodate that. The world’s a big place and in order to have most of the things you need really close isn’t really entirely realistic.
I live ~5 minutes from my work, but unless I want to walk/bike on the shoulder of a road where people are regularly going 60mph I have no option besides driving. And i live in a small town, must be even worse for medium/large sized cities
Not in places where they build proper roads/infrastructure. Generally this gets better the larger the city is, not worse.
Your situation sounds terrible but your local jurisdiction could choose to fix it. If enough people advocate for it, it will happen.
How many are built for bikes/walking and not cars? All i see are parking lots on top of parking lots all over the goddamn country
Definitely a lot of work yet to be done, but in my experience most reasonably sized cities are at least beyond the “share lanes with cars on the highway” stage of things. That’s a pretty low bar.
Petition the city to change that. Have them add protected pedestrian routes in that area.
It is not a city, we are barely a town. It is not realistic with the way buildings are spaced, most people would need to walk dozens of miles to get anywhere they needed to get to.
They’re just trying to get to work, what is this attempting to accomplish
Lmfao, this is a completely nondisruptive protest, it literally does nothing to stop people from getting to work.
In the UK, we’ve been having protests which actively disrupt traffic, which gets people going “why can’t they protest in ways that affect oil refineries/politicians etc” except people were doing that prior with no media coverage, and since having gained media coverage and then doing that, they get criticised for protests targeting politicians…
What this goes to show is that disruptive protesting will get media coverage, and that many people will pay lip service but will inherently lose their shit over people protesting if it even has the slightest chance of disrupting someone’s day.
The best media coverage is gathered by Led By The Donkeys and none of their actions were disruptive. Most British protesters are just attention whores.
Making people aware that many child deaths are preventable for example. Car accidents are the leading cause of death for kids 4-15 years old.
Okay so… they still need to get to work. Are you missing that essential point.
I don’t understand this comment. Are you saying this is trying to stop them from getting to work? (It isn’t.) Are you saying cars are the only way they can’t get to work. (It isn’t, though many places we need to invest more into other options.)
Literally yes to all of that. Do you work in an America and work a job?
How does a sign stop them from driving to work? Also, you can choose to live closer to your work and bike or walk or take public transportation.
Regardless, this is to convince people to speak up and ask for improvements to alternatives rather than letting people act like driving is the only option. Its the only reasonable option to a lot of people in America particularly, but it isn’t the only option possible, and it’s also not the cheapest or most reliable. It will stay the only option if people don’t realize we can have something better if we work towards it.
So, you clearly don’t have a job in America. You really be saying “choose to live closer to your work” during a housing crisis and where people are stuck renting forever lol. You are incredibly out of touch with reality.
Dude, what is your issue. I gave several options and said that driving is the only reasonable option for many people currently, but they need to work for making other options available, because they are possible. I do live in America by the way and understand the realities plenty, which is why I said people need to work for better solutions. This is a fucking sign though, which isn’t blocking anything, and you’re arguing they need to shut the sign down because it hurts your feelings because you aren’t taking another option and aren’t doing anything to fix things.
You are simultaneously saying “they have to have a car because they don’t live anywhere near work because there’s not enough housing” and “we shouldn’t try to reduce our car dependence so that we can use the now-unnecessary parking lots for housing”
Walk. Get a different job. Move closer to work. So many options that don’t involve killing children. But you’ll just throw your hands up because “they still need to get to work!”
Believe me, I don’t like cars either but this is a dumb as hell response. Just get a different job lol, is that your response to solving cars? I hope I don’t have to tell you how ignorantly stupid of a response is, who are you even sending that message to? Yes, work is a requirement of living, so it literally is a hands up situation because it’s a requirement. Must be nice in your mom’s basement to not have to work and understand the real world.
Also equating driving a car to child killing is fucking unhinged. I don’t know if you think this is some sensational eye catching response to prove a point, but it just makes you sound irrational and crazy to the point where you’re going to get laughed out of the room.
We are causing children to die and get paralyzed out of convenience. Sure, people need to get to work but with how things are now it comes at a steep price.
If most people drive then it has massive negetive consequences for both drivers and non drivers. Roads, parking and infrastructure all have financial costs, opportunity costs and negative externalities and take up valuable land in cities. Climate change is just the icing on the cake. Cars also cause noise pollution, stress, traffic and make cities less safe.
Public transport and biking don’t have these problems and per passanger cheaper when taking in account public and private spending.
Unfortunately you can’t fit all this on a small led billboard so I guess we have to settle for whatever this guy did.
Personal transport also has massive benefits. Try transporting a few sheets of drywall on public transport. Try moving a sick person to the hospital. Try living outside of an urban centre…
Taxis and deliveries exist for moving drywall and sick people. If time is of the essence then an ambulance is better. People who live outside of an urban center would probably like convenient public transport instead of going downtown in a car and trying to find parking.
Sure if you live in suburban US you have to drive anywhere to get to anything and in my opinion that sucks pretty hard. It doesn’t have to be that way forever though.
How many times are you moving drywall or transporting sick people to the hospital anyway?
Well two of probably a dozen or more requirements a week right? Your solution is “pay someone else with a vehicle” and after a certain number of times that makes less sense than just having a vehicle. Also imagine being a single mom who works with like 5 kids… Trying to manage that with paying for cabs or trying to use a bus…
For non urban people like me you unfortunely need a vehicle to get everything. I vastly prefer public transport if I’m going into a major city because parking is a major inconvience and expense.
Public transport in areas with low population density is unprofitable and poor service … Too few vehicles so long waits between pickups. My town has literally a single cab … Better be the first person to call if you need a ride to work …
Yeah it would be great if everyone wasn’t forced to have a car in order to get to work. Thanks for agreeing!
You are.
Removed by mod
you can’t stop driving when the city is trash and doesn’t have pt, this is just thoughtless optimism that isn’t helpful to anyone
I mean, you could quite possibly cycle… moreso if you opt to use an electric bike
Out of curiosity how big is your city/your normal commute?
I can cycle but I’ll have to cycle next to a 6 lane stroad and I don’t want to kms
Cars raped my father!
They turned me into a newt!
Do you know where we are?
Are you incorrectly assuming I’m being facetious?
You seem to not understand the nature of this community.
And you seem to think my comment was facetious when it wasn’t. Humorous, but still in the spirit of fuck cars.
“Cars kill kids”? Can you get more evil and propagandistic than that? What a dirty play on dumb people’s emotions.
“BuT wHat aBoUt tHe cHiLdReN?” 😭
Okay but, counterpoint, cars kill kids.
Edit, so I don’t have to keep repeating myself, and because this is important fucking information:
https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/home-and-community/safety-topics/deaths-by-transportation-mode/
Passenger vehicles are by far the most dangerous motorized transportation option compared. Over the last 10 years, passenger vehicle death rate per 100,000,000 passenger miles was over 20 times higher than for buses, 17 times higher than for passenger trains, and 595 times higher than for scheduled airlines.Other comparisons are possible based on passenger trips, vehicle miles, or vehicle trips, but passenger miles is the most commonly used basis for comparing the safety of various modes of travel.
Buses kill kids too. Trains too. Airplanes too. Let’s get rid of transportation.
Or is it about the numbers all of the sudden?
You’ve got to be a special level of dumb to think that anything in life has zero risk. Even food kills kids under certain circumstances.
https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/home-and-community/safety-topics/deaths-by-transportation-mode/
Passenger vehicles are by far the most dangerous motorized transportation option compared. Over the last 10 years, passenger vehicle death rate per 100,000,000 passenger miles was over 20 times higher than for buses, 17 times higher than for passenger trains, and 595 times higher than for scheduled airlines. Other comparisons are possible based on passenger trips, vehicle miles, or vehicle trips, but passenger miles is the most commonly used basis for comparing the safety of various modes of travel.
There are multiple considerations here. Here are two:
First: these numbers are absolute, not percentages. What makes you think if only buses, trains and trucks are driven the numbers of deaths won’t rise?
Second: there are many things we do that have higher risks than driving and kill kids. Do you think we should ban them all? Or only driving because you’ve been brainwashed to believe it’s the cause of all suffering for humanity?
I can come up in two minutes with a dystopian setting where we all live in pods and eat bugs. That’ll probably minimize deaths. Would you like to have that “safe” future?
Those aren’t absolute rates, those are effectively per capita
Per capita, not per type of vehicle. My point still stands.
Also, don’t evade the questions. Otherwise enjoy the bugs in a pod while you’re safe and don’t complain about those who seek freedom.
Drowning kills kids. Shall we get rid swimming pools?
There are other, better ways to transport people that are not only more efficient, but significantly safer. Cars are basically the worst way our society could practically organise our transport needs.
There is no other way to swim than by getting in the water, but if your pool in particular keeps on killing loads of people then maybe your pool in particular has a problem and should be shut down.
Edit:
https://injuryfacts.nsc.org/home-and-community/safety-topics/deaths-by-transportation-mode/
Passenger vehicles are by far the most dangerous motorized transportation option compared. Over the last 10 years, passenger vehicle death rate per 100,000,000 passenger miles was over 20 times higher than for buses, 17 times higher than for passenger trains, and 595 times higher than for scheduled airlines.Other comparisons are possible based on passenger trips, vehicle miles, or vehicle trips, but passenger miles is the most commonly used basis for comparing the safety of various modes of travel.
I’m all for reducing the amount of cars on the road, but in many areas it’s simply not practical not to own one.
I’ve done the math. Not owning a car at all or paying for note/gas/maintenance/insurance, and instead living in walking/cycling distance from work would require me to spend about $700/month more than I am now living 35 miles away and paying for my car expenses, and would leave me effectively stranded at work.
Don’t forget that your taxes go towards other people’s driving. Gas, roads and parking comes out of your taxes.
Don’t also forget that your commute is probably 1 hour each way of unpaid work.
If there was an alternative you couldn’t drown in then yes, we should get rid of swimming pools.
If the leading cause of death globally 4-15 year olds is car accidents then it’s not a dirty play IMO.
