Thread by @homemadeguitars

I try to write a climate / ecosystem / biosphere / natural science thread every night.
On the one hand, I understand that it's probably hopeless.
Exactly zero of the big climate accounts will specifically recommend slowing to reduce energy throughput.
I've asked them to.

I've gotten blocked for it. Because I refuse to sign on to renewable energy machinery at any scale.
If we need some, fine, we've already got some.
Use that.
Start paying back your carbon debt, instead of adding to it like a payday loan forever.
Reduce energy use today.

3. There is, to the best of my knowledge, not one big-league, hundred-k follower, climate activist account on Twitter that routinely advocates any specific action to reduce emissions today.
Not one.
We know how.
It's free.
It actually reduces costs.
Not. One. Climate. Spokesman.

4. Lots of good abstractions.
"Degrow."
Specify an action for tomorrow which constitutes degrowth.
Abstraction.
Most of them won't even go as far as a nice, safe, abstract "Degrowth."
Peter Kalmus says, "Halt fossil fuel use."
Every specific action he publicly advocates for

5. is based on immediate, drastic increases of fossil fuel use.
Talk, my friends, is cheap.
If you don't like my method of reducing energy throughput, specify another.
An action which society, people writ large, can take tomorrow.
You could turn off all the lights in all the home

6. and not get an energy reduction equal to a nationwide 10 mph reduction in speed limits strictly enforced.
Probably turn off all the furnaces, too, home heat, and still not save as much as that gasoline and diesel.
If we figured out a way to shrink joules in aviation,

7. Probably by restricting the number of flights comparably -
I got told yesterday that he didn't want to sound radical.
I'll tell you what radical is.
Radical is, the global energy machine breaks down from pandemic and 97% of all the people in Arizona die of thirst in five days.

8. And Nevada.

9. Radical is, the United States of America is going to build 1.3 trillion dollars worth of concrete and steel infrastructure, mostly highways and airports, and virtually the entire "climate concerned" portion of America is fine with that. Pissed off cos we didn't sign up

10. For an additional $555 billion in fossil fuel powered construction.
This is the climate conversation.
To say that we should, right now today, act like we give a fuck about the climate and (1) deep-six that whole infrastructure plan, and (2) slam on a national speed limit -

11. That's radical.
If a whole string of towns in Colorado burning down in one giant conflagration doesn't justify radical action, would someone like to explain to me what might?

12. People, ten or twenty years from now is not the goal. Net Zero is not the goal.
Scraping through the godawful mess we have put ourselves in without the sudden death of five or six billion people is the goal.
And even that ain't gonna be easy.

13. We have been building renewables about as fast as we are able for a decade or more.
Our fossil fuel use has gone up exponentially the whole time.
We've put ten years in it and are farther behind than when we started.
The news is filled with gleeful cheers about things which

14. all, without exception, constitute new large scale uses of fossil fuels on top of the already enormous scales of fossil fuel use which powers every part of our economy.
New. Large. Scale. Uses. Of. Fossil. Fuels.
Then we snivel because they pump and mine it.
We told them to.

15. And to suggest otherwise is radical.
Climate world, talk to me.
How do you want to reduce energy throughput today?
We've got these hashtags. #ClimateCrisis #ClimateAction #ClimateEmergency
Climate action is, in specific terms, never defined. Generally, it's "renewables."

16. I say, #ClimateAction world, that 100% of your recommended actions require immediate increases in fossil fuel energy throughput.
Prove me wrong.
I say, #ClimateCrisis world, that you ignore the facts and the science of manufacturing and installing your chosen solution.
P M W.

17. I say, #NetZero , that adding CO2 to the atmosphere today on the promise that someday you will, not remove that CO2, but "won't emit" it to get "the same energy." Or whatever.
You're adding CO2 today. Lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of CO2 today.
We don't have room.

18. We absolutely know how to immediately reduce our energy throughput for zero direct cost.
But it would have a huge cost on the economy.
Fossil fuel is a gigantic hunk of our total GDP.
Anything which reduces fossil fuel use reduces GDP directly, and also indirectly. Every $

19. Every dollar not spent on gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel, bunker oil, is a dollar removed from the GDP for the year.
So, you know, we may hate the fossil fuel companies, but we live off of them too.
I'm taking the chance. I'm slowing down. If nobody else does, I save money.

20. If a few other people do, we all save money.
If all 60% of America who claims to be concerned about climate change does it, our emissions go down.
If we're really concerned, after that we slow down again.
What is really radical is basing an international agreement on fiction.

21. Thusly.

22. I'm outta here.