Devil in the Details

As we are discovering with our local climate strike action, coming up with a set of demands is a challenge. Do you go reasonable, maybe a few reforms a local authority could enact? Or do you demand the impossible: ie. we need an end to economic growth. It is difficult to convey the enormity of the crisis when calling for a retro-fit here and an electric bus there. We need people to grasp the fact that not only do we need to drastically curtail emissions ( while building a new infrastructure)but we need to bring current concentrations of CO2 down quickly. Had we started 20 years ago, when ppm were at 380, it would have been a monumental challenge. But starting now? That's why Trump skipped the climate meeting at the G7; Bush 1 stated our position very +clearly ("the American way of life is not negotiable") and there is nothing more to be said. It took two centuries of pillage and plunder, of invasion and expropriation, and we sure as fuck aren't about to start handing it back as "climate debt".

You could just say "do whatever it takes to get to 1.5" or "do whatever it takes to get to net 0 emissions by 2050" or "do whatever it takes to stay within our carbon budget". But then you get to those tricky details: including nuclear? including carbon sequestration? including biofuels? et... This is the real battleground, the site where "green capitalism" tries to step up and offer win-win solutions. By questioning any of these high-tec fixes you are accused of "forming a circular firing squad", causing disunity and unwelcome strife.

If you want to start with generalities the DSA Green New Deal Principles do a good job: Decarbonize fully by 2030, Democratize control over major energy systems and resources, decommodify survival, and redistribute resources from the worst polluters

Then you can start to work in the details: reduce CO2 by 45% from 2010 levels by 2030 ( also need methane and sulfur dioxide reductions) You can go to the carbon budget from the report: remaining budget of 420 GtCO2 for a two-thirds chance to stay under 1.5

The beauty is that the goals articulated by the best available science cannot be reached without undermining capitalism as it really exists ( not theoretical capitalism but the form we currently live under)