Do you suffer from anxiety about climate change and its effects?

I moved to Maryland in 2010. In the 13 years I’ve been here, I have definitely noticed effects of climate change. Snow has become rare in the winter. There are more 100F days in the summer. And there are fewer insects, with the exception of carpenter bees, which you usually only saw on the Virginia side of the Potomac.

That’s just in my backyard. Elsewhere, Lake Mead and the Great Salt Lake are literally drying up. The jet stream that has a major impact on our weather might just disappear some day in the near future. Also, the entire country of Australia caught on fire a while back.

What gives me anxiety is how damned fast these changes happened. It wasn’t a shift that happened over the span of a generation, it’s only been a dozen years. I can’t help but wonder, how are things going to look in another 12-13 years at this rate?

Have you ever made significant individual lifestyle choices because of climate change?

Individual lifestyle changes aren’t going to be enough. 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global carbon emissions. And a significant chunk of those emissions come from oil companies. We need to be more aggressive in banning new sales of petroleum-burning vehicles and invest in other forms of zero-emission, mass transit. I take the Metro whenever I go into DC, but it doesn’t do much good when the Beltway is constantly packed with SUVs and trucks.

What do you think of proposed technologies like carbon capture? Do you think they’re useful, or a technocratic waste of time? Can they be viably used at large scale on any reasonable timeframe?

No idea if they’re viable, but I do know we’re running out of time, and any possible solution is worth exploring. Even if we do significantly cut global carbon emissions at this point, damage has already been done. I think that it will be necessary to develop technology to reverse that damage, one way or another.

1. Yes, but its relatively minor on the scale of things that give me anxiety. Not to suggest that climate change is in any way “minor”, I just have more pressing and immediate concerns.
2. I’ve made minor changes here and there, but nothing I’d qualify as a “significant lifestyle choice”.
3. No. My area isn’t that affected (yet).
4. I don’t know enough climate science to have a truly informed answer, but I’m inclined to say yes. Realistically I don’t expect us to level off until its far too late.
5. Climate change is an existential threat, so we should explore all possible ways to control it. But once again, I don’t know enough science to comment on carbon capture specifically.
6. Maybe in the future, but its way too soon. That’s a conversation for after we’ve solved the crisis, not before. Side note: I’m skeptical of the linked chart. Everything I’ve read suggests that China has a severe problem with air pollution, but the chart claims that China is actually doing better than many other nations. Maybe I’m missing something, but that doesn’t pass the sniff test. I’d appreciate an explanation if I’m wrong or missing something.

Do you suffer from anxiety about climate change and its effects?

No. A tidal wave is coming, I do not fret over how to stop it, I plan on how to ride it, and barring that, how to resurface. Maybe we as a group will build systems to reduce it, but I cannot stop it on my own, I have better things to worry about so hard.

Have you ever made significant individual lifestyle choices because of climate change?

Not yet, I will likely go heavy into solar/electrification if I ever get my own home, but even that seems like a bandaid for a systemic issue. I’m not a massive consumer, and would likely be happy with just a computer, some cheap food, an electric scooter, and living in a small house if it wasn’t for future aspirations of a moderately large family. I’d live in an apartment if I could guarantee good neighbors (yeah right).

Have you ever thought of leaving where you live because of potential future climactic effects? Have you actually moved already because of them?

I think my area isn’t too terrible for future events. Might get really rough deep into summer, but I don’t think we have the humidity for wet bulb events, so my only real risks are increased tornadoes, flooding, and maybe drought.

Do you think the world can limit global warming to 1.5C or 2C? Where do you think we’ll “level off” in terms of warming–especially if you don’t think we’ll meet either of those goals?

No, the West is dialing down on carbon emissions, but it’s slow. And even if we went carbon neutral, growing economies like India are going to offset any of our progress. Plus, I don’t think the vast majority of the 1st world has the spine to cut consumption to sustainable levels, or pay for them. I don’t pay enough attention to temperature levels to give a useful number.

What do you think of proposed technologies like carbon capture? Do you think they’re useful, or a technocratic waste of time? Can they be viably used at large scale on any reasonable timeframe?

Haven’t bothered keeping up with technologies much. In theory are likely cool and possibly able to help fix carbon, doubt anyone uses them to a scale that’s useful.

Do you support something like climate reparations either now or in the future? Do you think such a thing is even viable?

Worthless concept imo, at least in raw money. Going to be hard for most countries to stomach giving that money over, especially countries they’re moderately hostile to (China). Probably better off pushing for negative carbon emissions at home to offset the other countries and investment into their systems to make them more efficient. Not to mention the Twitter post already starts to dip into targeting the rich, which will make it a non-starter.

Edit: This somehow got posted to a different thread after I edited it? I had to repost it here.

-Do you suffer from anxiety about climate change and its effects?

Hahahahaha yes. Every day. It’s tough going about your daily life knowing full well there’s no future unless we have a revolution yesterday. It’s especially hard when the sky is full of smoke at the end of every summer (I live in the PNW).

-Have you ever made significant individual lifestyle choices because of climate change?

I became a vegetarian for unrelated reasons, but climate change is part of the reason I stick with it, if that counts. Otherwise, no. What could I even do that would have a significant impact on climate change? Nothing. Even my vegetarianism is worthless in that regard. It’s not consumers like me who are causing it, it’s the giant corporations who won’t stop slurping down oil and shit. I suppose if I want to be a moral person, I should go vegan and stop using my car, but my diet is restricted enough as it is and public transport here is so shitty I’d have to sacrifice hours every day to still be able to get to work on time. Why make myself miserable for something that won’t matter in the end anyway?

-Have you ever thought of leaving where you live because of potential future climactic effects? Have you actually moved already because of them?

A little, but where would I go? The PNW is already one of the better places to be, and it’s still awful here. Anywhere else would surely be worse.

-Do you think the world can limit global warming to 1.5C or 2C? Where do you think we’ll “level off” in terms of warming–especially if you don’t think we’ll meet either of those goals?

Of course we can, and of course we won’t. We’re barely even trying. I have no idea where we’ll level off, but it will likely be at an apocalyptic temperature.

-What do you think of proposed technologies like carbon capture? Do you think they’re useful, or a technocratic waste of time? Can they be viably used at large scale on any reasonable timeframe?

I don’t know enough about them to say. My immediate instinct is distrust of anything that doesn’t involve radically changing how our society functions, but anything is better than nothing.

-Do you support something like climate reparations either now or in the future? Do you think such a thing is even viable?

Sure, might as well throw that in on top of all the other reparations we ought to pay. But good luck getting the high emitters to agree to anything like that, even assuming climate change doesn’t kill us all within a few decades.

1 - Not really. I’m past that point, into the ‘acceptance’ part. 2 - Went vegetarian just before Covid hit. Don’t own a car since last summer - mostly because I’m lucky enough to have a route to my work. Never going back to car dependency, public transit is very nice. Eyeing my gaming rig next, but it’d be a major change for me. 3 - I’m in the American Midwest, so besides moving a bit further north, nah not really. 4 - Hell no. World leaders couldn’t figure out how to not kill their own people during a pandemic. The number of leaders actively shouting that nothing was wrong during Covid is something that I’ll never forget. We’ll get there when we get there, and not a milli-degree sooner. 5 - Technology is only as useful as the social will to use it. We could knock climate change dead tomorrow by junking all the cars and building a bunch of streetcars - something invented in the late 1800s. Could fancy schmancy carbon capture be useful? Sure. Will it? Enh. 6 - We’ll be incredibly damn lucky if the well-off countries don’t literally start shooting climate refugees. Would redistributing resources to provide for those less fortunate be a good idea? Sure. Try pushing that idea to anyone who’s not already a leftist.

1. Not really ‘anxiety’ yet, more of ‘concern’ and ‘interest’. There may be anxiety later if we turn into tornado country.
2. Yes. I don’t have and will never have a car, I don’t replace appliances until they are destroyed/unrepairable, I avoid stuff that looks nice if I can’t justify it.
3. No. But I live in one of the more ‘resilient’ areas. May change in future.
4. We’re still increasing the rate we’re adding CO2 (though this will change soon), so no, we’ll not limit it below 2C. There is no political will for a drastic WW2-style effort to go carbon-zero in a short time (even if it’s technically achievable). Temperatures will keep rising until CO2 levels actually start decreasing, and there may be more positive feedback effects (methane, water) that will make them rise beyond that point. I don’t think we’ll level off below 4C. If positive feedbacks kick in, the limit is unpredictable, may even be 8C. We will be able to reverse either of those (unless we go full Venus), but at an extreme human cost in the latter case.
5. Absolutely useful, as a part of the solution. People often say we shouldn’t do this, we should do that, (solar, nuclear, reforestation, carbon capture, less cows, geoengineering etc.) - you can’t have everyone do one thing and you shouldn’t have all your eggs in one basket - we need to do everything at once (well, I don’t think geoengineering is a good idea anytime soon). Of course CCS should not be used as an excuse to emit carbon elsewhere (see also: biomass, biofuels). If we get hit by positive feedback effects, we will need to be drastically carbon negative - and for that, CCS (or geoengineering) is needed (reforestation only works until you, uh, reforest everything).
6. Yes, but not as described on said post - we need support for worst-hit countries, and refugees from those countries (this may include moving entire populations in case of small island nations). I don’t support giving money to large semi-fascist regimes like China (and increasingly India) unless it involves directly supporting ways to replace their carbon-based economies. It will not happen and we will pay for the consequences. I.e. I don’t support ‘climate justice’ here, I support ‘stopping climate change’.

1. Oh absolutely I do. It’s just lurking there threatening the environment we all live in while we fight amongst ourselves about other stuff, constantly getting more and more alarming. Great.

2. After the entire state of CA introduced “catching on fire non-stop” as one of it’s seasons, I’ve mostly been focusing on my transportation patterns. I’ve become pretty anti-car and pro-transit, and I’ve decided against driving a car for any trips shorter than 5 miles, which accounts for over half of car trips in the US. We still have my girlfriend’s car that we use for longer trips outside of the citys transit network, but we’re living very car lite now.

3. We recently relocated to a city, mostly for walkability, but the climate here is a little cooler too which is a nice change from the triple digit summers we were getting in the suburbs too!

4. I think we can but dread that we won’t. I’m not super well versed but we keep blowing past the warning signs and the climate change we’re feeling now. Even if we were able to cut our emissions to 30% of what they are now, we’re still projected to exceed the 1.5C limit, and even that would be an incredible, even unbelievable win.

5. From what I’ve seen (not a lot!!), carbon recapture seems pretty inefficient and uses a lot of energy that could be leveraged elsewhere. Is it a waste of time? Not sure. It would depend on what the costs of R&D are to get it to something that actually scales, but in it’s current iteration it’s useless imo.

6. Honestly? I don’t know what to make of them. Seems fair, but also sounds extremely unlikely to actually happen, and probably something that should be sorted out after we actually have better solutions in place for slowing/stopping climate change.

Do you suffer from anxiety about climate change and its effects?

Suffer from is a strong way of phrasing it, but yeah it’s one of the things that makes me a little nervous about the future along with US politics 🙃

Have you ever made significant individual lifestyle choices because of climate change?

Yes. I drive a Prius when I have to, I work from home, I’m moving from a rented duplex back into an apartment complex for energy efficiency and walkability in no small part, and I try not to eat too much meat.

Have you ever thought of leaving where you live because of potential future climactic effects? Have you actually moved already because of them?

I mean I don’t love where I live currently, it’s too hot already and doesn’t have a lot of the cultural stuff that I like, plus the state politics are the kind that make me nervous. Planning to move in a few years when I am able to somewhere more amenable in all of those ways.

Do you think the world can limit global warming to 1.5C or 2C? Where do you think we’ll “level off” in terms of warming–especially if you don’t think we’ll meet either of those goals?

Can, absolutely. Will? Maybe. Technology is getting crazy and it’s only set to get crazier, and largely the cost battle has been won in favor of renewables already. Failing that, I think the hearts and minds of young people are already broadly on the right track, it’s just going to take longer for them to make a difference.

What do you think of proposed technologies like carbon capture? Do you think they’re useful, or a technocratic waste of time? Can they be viably used at large scale on any reasonable timeframe?

On one hand, I think we’re at the point where we’ve got to consider everything. If things turn out to be worse than we expect, and they look like they’ll be pretty bad, then we have got to have some tools like that to try and salvage things. On the other hand, carbon capture especially I think is used to justify more fossil fuel use now, with the thought that the carbon can just be captured later, which I don’t love.

Do you support something like climate reparations either now or in the future? Do you think such a thing is even viable?

I don’t know really. I think wealthy countries should absolutely help poorer countries leapfrog fossil fuels and get directly to clean energy, but I’m not sure that’s the same thing.

Have you ever thought of leaving where you live because of potential future climactic effects? Have you actually moved already because of them?

Yes…We moved to western Maine because it was going to be one of the least affected areas in the US.