We are greening ourselves to extinction

[Ponietz]

[https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/1/29/greening-ourselves-to-extinction]

Vijay Kolinjivadi is a post-doctoral fellow at the Institute of Development Policy at the University of Antwerp.

More than a decade ago, investment experts James Altucher and Douglas Sease wrote a book for the Wall Street Journal called Investing in the Apocalypse. They argued that the end of the world is a profitable opportunity for those who know how to “fade the fear”, as everyone else panics. They maintained that when disaster strikes, investors should approach it with the rationale that “no matter how bad things seem, they really aren’t that bad”.

Well before the COVID-19 pandemic, they advised investing in big pharmaceutical companies as a strategy to reap dividends from global pandemics. They also encouraged putting money into renewable energy systems while ramping up oil production.

Today, it seems many have followed Althucher and Sease’s advice. Under the guise of taking action on the pandemic, billions of dollars have been poured into big pharma, instead of public health and policies aimed at preventing another global outbreak. The supposed energy transition that has been undertaken has seen renewable energy production expanded, but there has been no indication that oil and gas are being substituted and ultimately phased out.

What is worse, governments and corporations have teamed up to turn the apocalypse into a money-making opportunity. They have rushed to put forward false solutions to the climate crisis: from the push to replace fuel-engine vehicles with electric ones, to so-called climate-smart agriculture, to protected areas for nature conservation and massive tree planting projects for carbon offsets.

….

[CentralMass]

1. That's a load.

[moniss]

3. Yes indeed

and we are seeing a large increase in articles etc. claiming that energy conservation, green energy, alternatives in transportation etc. are failing/bad etc. Most all of them fail to give source studies, methodology, disclosure of funding, disclosure of conflicts, past work by the authors on behalf of conflicted interests etc.

[phoenix75]

2. Quotation from "How the World is Made" by John Michell:

"The universe is a material structure and neither immortality nor infinity are properties of matter."

Nothing physical can be eternal, not even this little marble in the universe that we call home. The eventual demise of our planet is inevitable.

[mahina]

4. Nonsense

To be polite

[Brenda]

5. Definitely has a valid point.

Does anyone really think eliminating plastic straws, using reusable grocery bags or planting trees are even making a dent in the warming/change/pollution crisis we are in?

Yeah, disaster capitalism is running smoothly. The profiteers are making a killing while us peasants can "feel good about ourselves" for doing the absolute least required to make any kind of difference. Buying an electric car is useless when the infrastructure is not there. Funding Big Pharma instead of paying enough medical staff and encouraging health over drugs and for-profit healthcare only makes the problems worse.

Green Washing is real and absurd. You can't wean off of oil and gas, continue corporate monoculture agriculture and an economy based upon conspicuous consumption and cheap junk that has to be continually replaced and expect any measurable changes to the degradation of our planet.

Massive changes need to be implemented yesterday but the people "in charge" can't even agree on what the problem is.

[Ponietz]

6. Get a groovy Tesla and pat yourself on the back for doing your part

It’s a win-win! Just don’t focus on those pesky reports that a few cities, or entire countries, are underwater. Oh, and the GDP rose 2.9%!

[CentralMass]

7. And yet EVs sales are increasing and the infrastructure is growing.

The infrastructure s growing. They can be ,albeit slowly, with as little ad extension cord overnight gir any that has an outlet to plug in. The infrastructure bill has considerable funding to expand the network. There are employers putting chargers in their parking lots and there are public chargers in a lot of shopping plazas
There are 4 within a mile of where I live. My employer has quite a few in their parking lots..

DC Fast charging is getting better and faster all the time