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Originally Posted by Yakk
As an example, SO2 production.
The rate of emissions of many pollutants in the USA has dropped massively. This isn't an edge case. The US environmental laws have had huge impacts over the last half-century.
You can check any source -- hell, wikipedia -- and it will spew the massive reduction in sulphur dioxide emissions from the 1970s, 1980s, all the way to today.
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Well, to nitpick, you originally said "By orders of magnitude". Wikipedia, as you mentioned, shows a not-quite-50% reduction. A good trend, but not orders of magnitude.
Also, I thought you meant that these gains had been made by economic forces, or something like that. They haven't, they've been made by regulation.
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Originally Posted by Yakk
Why yes. But when you buy gas, you should be paying for the costs of production (and side-effects of consumption, as they are relatively easy to quantify). When you buy iron, you should be paying for the costs of production.
Many of these things can be quantified, and if quantified, we'd do them in about the right amount, instead of religiously banning or blinding supporting the action.
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Ah, but currently environmental impact isn't factored into the cost of production or consumption, except by blunt methods such as regulation and combined taxes (sales tax, gas taxes, etc...)
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Originally Posted by Yakk
Sure, but ... you do know that the Earth is made out of a huge percentage of iron? Iron ore in high concentrations on the surface of the planet is more rare, because iron is dense and likes to sink. The rarity of iron ore has a lot to do with what technologies we have to extract it, and not all that much to do with how much "there is".
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Sure, I was just using Iron as an example. And while we can get more iron with improved extraction methods, those extraction methods are likely to have even more of an impact.
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Originally Posted by Yakk
Well, if you worked out the costs of making the results of the recycling process through other means, and worked out the costs of recycling the widget, and you work out the costs of disposing of the widget through other means, the answer would be clear. Replace + Dispose vs Recycle. One side will be bigger. That is the correct choice, assuming you worked out the costs right.
On the other hand, if you simply said "recycling good, disposal bad", you might ignore the cases where recycling is far more expensive than just going out and getting more iron from a hole in the ground. This is a true waste of resources.
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I agree. But figuring that out is hard.
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Originally Posted by Yakk
Sure -- but you can price in the environmental impacts.
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But we don't. By and large, environmental costs aren't figured into production costs. Hypothetically, we could do exactly that instead of relying on the blunt instrument of regulation that we do now - but there are lots of complications. Consider - even now there are very loud voices that claim that global warming is a hoax. All those people would advocate that emitting CO2 should bear no cost at all. These same groups claimed that SO2 didn't cause acid rain. Who is going to set the environmental costs? Whatever group it is will be intensely lobbied by industry to set the environmental costs as low as they can get away with. And, in some (most) cases, there is legitimate scientific debate about the exact environmental impact. That uncertainty leaves lots of room for unscrupulous parties to manipulate the science in their favor.
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Originally Posted by Yakk
Imagine if there are 10 coconut trees on an island.
As it stands, the entire population is living barely above starvation, eating those coconuts (with just enough to plant new trees at about the same rate that old trees die)
It turns out you can do a research project. This project will require "over consuming" the coconuts, reducing the max capacity of the island to 8 coconut trees.
However, the research project will also double the yield of each coconut tree.
The environmental impact on the island is negative -- 20% reduction in the island's yield!
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Er - no, I figure a 60% increase in the yield of coconuts. A 20% reduction in the # of coconut trees, though.
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Originally Posted by Yakk
The overall impact? 60% increase in wealth.
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There we go. However, things are never that simple. Cutting down the two coconut trees results in more soil erosion, and increasing the yield of the coconut trees depletes the remaining soil. In 20 years, the island is uninhabited.
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Originally Posted by Yakk
*nod*. And pricing in the environmental cost into our decisions and purchases is a good idea, as it will let people know which are better decisions, and which are worse.
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Aside from the complications I mentioned above, this is a great idea.
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Originally Posted by Yakk
Actually, I thought the USA was just barely above replacement, domestically? But, the developed world as a whole is far below replacement, yes.
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List of countries and territories by fertility rate - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Says we're at 2.1, which is about right.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Yakk
Often, having a baby is a gamble investment. If things go bad, the baby can just starve. If things do a bit better, and the child reaches 10+, it can start contributing to your well being.
Ie: apparently, the level of social safety nets/social security has a huge impact on fertility rates.
This is a tricky chicken/egg problem.
There is a third option. Massive increases in the amount of resources we have to use.
More energy, less emissions. More materials, better recycling and cleanup technologies, etc etc.
Take nuclear, for example. Built a massive nuclear power infrastructure, and you can run a society using modern western energy requirements for the remaining lifetime of the sun using known, earth-base, sources of uranium. (You need breeder reactors, and you do need to start going after unconventional sources of uranium, such as uranium dissolved in sea water, but uranium is really energy dense -- and in any case, that level of effort is only required after many 1000s of years of more conventional uranium sources).
As energy gets cheaper, and materials science gets better, and other technologies advance, seriously crazy solutions also pop out. Imagine talking to a English peasant about solving the English middle-ages deforestation (for cooking and heating) problem by building a solar energy power plant, to ship heating energy to homes over copper wires?
Ignoring the positive, and only paying attention to the negative, does mean we are doomed.
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I think you're being overly optimistic. For one thing, you're only counting on the upsides of energy and materials production. Sure, nuclear provides lots of energy, but the environmental impact of the waste (There's still nuclear waste, even with breeder reactors) has to be considered.
Sure, we can hope that technology will help solve our environmental problems. The technological advancements of the last century is certainly a hopeful sign. But that doesn't mean we can sit back and do nothing.