Actually it's just the geologic record and common sense.
There is no worldwide emphasis to stop killing the planet, now doubters and skeptics and selfish assholes all over the world have a champion in the White House.
Sad, but predictiable.
Fifty of the world’s richest billionaires on average produce more carbon through their investments, private jets and yachts in just over an hour and a half than the average person does in their entire lifetime, a new Oxfam report reveals today. The first-of-its-kind study, “Carbon Inequality Kills,” tracks the emissions from private jets, yachts and polluting investments and details how the super-rich are fueling inequality, hunger and death across the world. The report comes ahead of COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, amidst growing fears that climate breakdown is accelerating, driven largely by the emissions of the richest people.
If the world continues its current emissions, the carbon budget (the amount of CO2 that can still be added to the atmosphere without causing global temperatures to rise above 1.5°C) will be depleted in about four years. However, if everyones emissions matched those of the richest one percent, the carbon budget would be used up in under five months. And if everyone started emitting as much carbon as the private jets and superyachts of the average billionaire in Oxfam’s study, it would be gone in two days.
“The super-rich are treating our planet like their personal playground, setting it ablaze for pleasure and profit. Their dirty investments and luxury toys —private jets and yachts— aren’t just symbols of excess; they’re a direct threat to people and the planet,” said Oxfam International Executive Director Amitabh Behar.
“Oxfam’s research makes it painfully clear: the extreme emissions of the richest, from their luxury lifestyles and even more from their polluting investments, are fueling inequality, hunger and —make no mistake— threatening lives. It’s not just unfair that their reckless pollution and unbridled greed is fueling the very crisis threatening our collective future —it’s lethal," said Behar.
The report, the first-ever study to look at both the luxury transport and polluting investments of billionaires, presents detailed new evidence of how their outsized emissions are accelerating climate breakdown and wreaking havoc on lives and economies. The world’s poorest countries and communities have done the least to cause the climate crisis, yet they experience its most dangerous consequences.
Oxfam found that, on average, 50 of the world’s richest billionaires took 184 flights in a single year, spending 425 hours in the air —producing as much carbon as the average person would in 300 years. In the same period, their yachts emitted as much carbon as the average person would in 860 years.
Billionaires’ lifestyle emissions dwarf those of ordinary people, but the emissions from their investments are dramatically higher still —the average investment emissions of 50 of the world’s richest billionaires are around 340 times their emissions from private jets and superyachts combined. Through these investments, billionaires have huge influence over some of the world’s biggest corporations and are driving us over the edge of climate disaster.
- Jeff Bezos’ two private jets spent nearly 25 days in the air over a 12-month period and emitted as much carbon as the average US Amazon employee would in 207 years. Carlos Slim took 92 trips in his private jet, equivalent to circling the globe five times.
- The Walton family, heirs of the Walmart retail chain, own three superyachts that in one year produced as much carbon as around 1,714 Walmart shop workers.
Think globally, act locally. Turn off your computer and open all the breakers in your electrical service.
You operate solely on emotion.
The pro-AGW side gets far more money than the other side.
I've studied paleoclimates for over 20 years. What have you done?
It's the ocean that determines the climate of the planet. Not the atmosphere. When heat is circulated from the Atlantic to the Arctic the northern hemisphere deglaciates and the oceans and atmosphere warm. When heat circulation from the Atlantic to the Arctic gets disrupted the northern hemisphere glaciates and the oceans and the atmosphere cool. Tons of data for this. No one disputes it.
When you went up in elevation and the temperature went down...CLIMATE CHANGE!!!
Thank you for coming back to me and your response was pretty much the same as what I hear from other advocates of AGW. Of course the fact that I can't find anyone who can say what is the temperature of whatever is heating up and why the increase is unusual, that proves nothing other than the fact that I'm not asking the right people.
Thank you for sharing a current temperature and the average for the previous century. All we need to know now is what it is that's heating, and the reason why the change is unwanted.
Excellent question, I used to live in the temperate latitudes and I found winter heating costs + wardrobe purchases to be exorbitant. Now I live in the tropical mountains and the temp outside is 72ºF year round. Besides comfort, world food production would be better if it were hotter.
OK, saying it's just the earth's atmosphere that's warming is a good step to clarity, but are we really saying that nothing else is warming --not the ice caps, not the oceans?
