Kyoto Krap and Peak Oil Poppycock

Either the supporters of the Kyoto Protocol are wholly stupid or don't give a shit about the environment.

Futhermore, all people mumbling about peak oil can shut up now.

Why the Kyoto Protocol is Busted

The Kyoto Protocol relies on emissions trading as their magic solution to reduce greenhouse gases. The goal is to reduce collective emissions of greenhouse gases by 5.2% compared to the year 1990.

Alrighty then. The protocol does insert economic incentives to countries to lower emissions, in the sense that if they don't stop polluting, they'll have to fork out a lot of money to countries that aren't.

It's all very well meaning, but it likely won't go down as the people who signed the agreement probably hope it would.

Here's whats going to happen:

• A developed nation (such as Canada) will realize it has not met its emissions goals by a long shot.
  Meeting emissions goals will be extremely difficult. Not only will you have to deal with more people, but you'll have to deal with more consumption. We're power hungry people. If you don't believe me, compare simply the amount of electronics you had in 1990 with the amount of electronics you have now.
  
  Now, factor in population growth, and you have more people with more stuff on. Right now, there are three computers running in this house, three TVs, three cars in the garage and countless light fixtures in the basement. Compare this to 1990, when there was a single computer in the house on only once in a while to play DOS games. The number of people living in the house hasn't changed, but consumption has increased.


• The developed nation will buy emissions credits from a developing country.
  You miss your targets, you pay the price. This is the heart of the incentive to lower your emissions.


• Developing country uses money for further development.
  This means more consumption. Buy all the things that all the other countries have. What the hell else would you do with a huge influx of money?


• Foreign aid decreases.
  When the developing nation is already forking out cash to developing countries for intangible emissions credits, how could they be expected to turn around and give more out of charity?


• Emissions do nothing but go up.
  No objective of this charade is satisfied, the environment still sucks and everyone still hates each other for it.

There's probably more than a few people that are saying "Haha, thats not how the Kyoto Protocol works, asshole! Kyoto makes sense!". Yes, it will be as successful as other systems trading in hard to quantify materials of unknown value... Sure.

The Kyoto Protocol has so much public support because it champions a worthy cause. It can safely be said that a majority of the population will say they support it, but it can also safely be said that a majority of the population has no fucking idea how it is supposed to work and how to evaluate if it is acheiving its goals.

But nevermind thinking for yourself, thats too hard.

Who the hell cares if we run out of oil?

Another thing that is kind of a farce is the whole peak oil "crisis". Would-be doomsayers tell us that peak oil production is happening pretty much as we speak and prices will soon skyrocket. They go on to say that since our society today is so dependent on oil that the economy will implode, everyone will be reduced to poverty and wars will break out.

That could be true. It may be the end of the world as we know it. But who cares?

The wars are already happening, and have been happening for quite some time. Yes, we're very dependent on oil, but only because we live pretty high on the hog. An oil shortage wouldn't kill you, it would just force you to change your ways.

Hell, if society returned to horses or bicycles as a primary form of transit, would it really matter? If the cost of distribution of vegetables was too high, wouldn't you just grow your own? God knows that you've all been growing your own dope all these years.

Society wouldn't entirely return to the middle ages by any means, we'd just lose a lot of the luxury. Boo-hoo. Suck it up.

The Solution - How to save the planet from the humans

The answer to both increasing emissions and the overhyped oil crisis comes from China. You know, the country that is probably going to use the most oil and produce the most emissions over the next century than any other country with the exception of India.

It's their one child policy. Instead of treating symptoms as emissions reducing technology would, they treat the source of the problem: consumers.

The whole peak oil thing and kyoto deal revolve around a central statement - that we are limited to finite resources. We are going to run out of clean air and petroleum. That is a pretty solid statement coming from all the scientific and political backing Kyoto has.

They also rely on a single solution, that is smart people. They are hoping to hell that someone smart comes along that figures out the next big source of clean energy. This isn't a bunch of engineers saying that they KNOW anything about clean energy. The Kyoto crowd is a big group of morons that are throwing their hands up in the air and saying "well, eventually somebody will invent a gizmo to solve this problem, then we'll buy it!".

China doesn't make any assumptions about the future. They don't go prancing around telling people that everything will be fine and to just squirt out babies. China is smart enough to realize that with resources X, population Y and consumption Z (tied to quality of life in pop culture), to increase Z given a static X, Y must be reduced.

The VHEMT group would take this idea a step further and urge people to not breed at all. It poses some interesting questions, as it is kind of a final solution to everything the Greenpeace/PETA/Amnesty International/UNICEF bitches about. The Earth would be fine, the forests would grow back, the animals would come back (it's a sad day when a single bear makes the news). What good is the human presence anyways? Does the sum of our actions equal an overall positive towards each other and the planet? Looking at history, the answer is probably not.

As far as your lifespan is concerned. The world ends within 80 or some years anyhow. Why not make it the endgame for all?

But the VHEMT group makes the assumption that people are inherently worth less than the world. (They do a lot of talking about "Gaia" which is a noun used by tools) I would be more inclined to say they are both equally valueless in that a world with people may be fucked up but a world without people may as well be a barren planet. The Earth would be great if we weren't on the damn thing, but who actually cares about the Earth? Humans don't, beyond the sense that a crappy planet would inconvenience them.

I could not care less about the planet, as if I did on an altruistic level I would cease to consume. What I do care about (well at least I try to pretend that I somewhat care about) is the future well-being of humanity. We have the capability to envision sustainable growth, however plans to realize that are nonexistent. (Building more windmills and solar panels does not equal sustainable growth)

If you have a better idea, let's hear 'em.