Thread by @doctorow

Back in 2009, I found the best technical book about climate change I've ever read: David McKay's SUSTAINABLE ENERGY WITHOUT THE HOT AIR:

memex.craphound.com/2009/04/08/sus…

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McKay's book was a first for me: not a popular SCIENCE book, but a popular ENGINEERING book, one that simply parameterized the way that we create and use energy, inviting the reader to draw their own conclusions about the tradeoffs we'd need to make to save our world.

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McKay's figures included things like the total number of solar photons that strike the Earth, the total tide-stresses exerted by the moon, the maximum possible efficiency of a plane-shape cylinder through air, etc.

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All of these represent the absolute best-case scenarios for various energy usage, production and storage problems, and anyone proposing a climate measure that exceeds these maximums is either ill-informed or actively lying.

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That volume, with its lucid prose and superb data-visualizations, begat a whole series. In 2011, there was SUSTAINABLE MATERIALS WITH BOTH EYES OPEN by Julian Allwood and Jonathan Cullen.

memex.craphound.com/2011/11/17/sus…

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SUSTAINABLE MATERIALS adopted McKay's axiom of focusing on making small changes to large causes, rather than large changes to small causes.

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Thus it zeroed in on the role that concrete and aluminium production play in emissions, after showing that all other material production amounts to a rounding error when compared to these two factors.

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2015 saw the publication of URBAN TRANSPORT WITHOUT THE HOT AIR, which adopts the same "small changes to big causes" approach by focusing on private automobiles (and the urban layouts they demand) as the major driver of emissions.

memex.craphound.com/2015/12/03/urb…

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Author @StevenMelia8 explores the potential - and limits - of buses, bikes, walking, rail, etc, and the role that planning plays in changing private automobile usage, and makes an excellent case that urban design is more important than transit links for reducing car usage.

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It's been half a decade since that last HOT AIR book, and now, fantastically, we have a new volume in the series: @sarahbridle's FOOD AND CLIMATE CHANGE WITHOUT THE HOT AIR.

uit.co.uk/food-and-clima…

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Bridle's volume is an important addition to the series, and uses a subtler knife - rather than opening with the small change in a big thing, she instead sketches out the emissions associated with a variety of prepared meals, organized by breakfast, lunch, snacks and dinner.

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All of this is framed around the idea that each human on Earth must rapidly draw down their food emissions to no more than 3kg/day if we're to meet the 1.5'C global warming target.

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Bridle tots up a cup of tea, an apple, bacon, a sandwich, a steak, fish and chips, etc, and shows how they fit into this picture. As the reader is drawn through this narrative, the inescapable logic of energy narrows down to an inexorable conclusion: we eat too many animals.

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Even leaving aside all questions of animal cruelty and human health, there's no escaping the fact that cow and sheep products, including milk, cannot be central to our diets if our species is to survive.

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Other meats - poultry, fish, and pork - are vastly more sustainable, but still must be drawn down in our daily eating in favor of plant-based diets (Bridle's very good on explaining how different methods of animal rearing have different emissions profiles).

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Other meats - poultry, fish, and pork - are vastly more sustainable, but still must be drawn down in our daily eating in favor of plant-based diets (Bridle's very good on explaining how different methods of animal rearing have different emissions profiles).

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Finally, waste is a huge contributor to emissions, and household kitchens are the worst culprits by far: while industrial food prep offcuts are sold off as animal feed, household waste (including massive volumes of spoiled food) might end up as compost, or worse, landfill.

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Like the other HOT AIR authors, Bridle's clear, nonthreatening, technical language, brilliant data visualizations, and example grounded in our daily experience make this a powerful read.

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For all its gentle, moderate language, it comes to a devastating conclusion: our species' survival depends on eating more plants, with more centrally (and efficiently) prepared meals.

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As with the other HOT AIR books, we're reminded that climate adaptation means significant changes to our lives - changes as profound as the industrial revolution. Bridle devotes significant language to discussing the social factors involved in such a shift.

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It's hard to imagine a better addition to the HOT AIR cannon: a volume that boils a complex, urgent issue into a clear, undeniable set of parameters with equally clear conclusions.

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If you want to experiment with Bridle's findings and methods, she's got an excellent "climate stack calculator" that lets you quickly assess the emissions associated with different food.

takeabitecc.org/calculator.html

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There's also a free ebook edition of this book; go to whatever ebook store you use and you'll find a copy for $0.00 that you can "buy" and download.

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(One more note before I close out: there's another HOT AIR volume, @ProfDavidNutt's spectacular DRUGS POLICY WITHOUT THE HOT AIR, which had a new edition last year)

pluralistic.net/2020/03/02/be-…

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(I didn't include it above because while it is an unmissable, essential volume, it doesn't deal with climate change)

eof/