What makes you think we won't survive 4C? I'm not saying you're wrong but the last IPCC report I read suggested global collapse was more on the order of 6 - 8 degrees.
Could you cite that one please?
Every IPCC reference I can find just now is citing 1.5C as the maximum temperature jump we could expect to cope with and not be guaranteed to have a cascade of catastrophic events.
The sentiment of 'we can survive 4C' feels weirdly phrased. Some people will survive, but it certainly won't be pretty for most people.
I can't see anything that reflects your earlier claim of:
> ... the last IPCC report I read suggested global collapse was more on the order of 6 - 8 degrees.
We are definitely headed to a 3C world because developing nations have zero incentive to risk economic growth rates over the next 30 years on a 18% economic hit 30 years from now. They’ll still be better off using fossil fuels to grow as cheaply as possible.
In my opinion, having well meaning politicians and activists target specific climate-improving projects for funding and climate-harming projects for penalties or cancellation is the wrong approach: it’s expensive, it often chooses the wrong winners and losers, and it’s ineffectual. Putting monetary incentives in place that apply to everyone as equally as practical lets the free market choose winners and losers, and the free market is pretty good at that.
(Also, the free market decouples the industries “responsible” for the problem from the often unrelated technologies that can help solve it. If a cement factory must pay $15/ton for its CO2 emissions, a startup selling carbon-free process heat that is only $5/ton more expensive than whatever a plant currently uses has a decent case to make a sale.)
This shouldn’t be the bar. The bar is avoiding a “global catastrophe” ie mass migration and the start of resource scarcity. All of which will occur significantly sooner than “global collapse”. It definitely requires more aggressive action early.
Obviously keep using oil and gas so we don’t shut off anyone’s heat or food supply tho. Otherwise, everything else including higher costs (ie total shit for many many people) should be utilized to avoid catastrophe.
It's not about redefining the bar, it's about avoiding rash policies like biofuel subsisies which cause large harm for minimal gain.
It is true that technically a 4C world is survivable, but it will be an immensely hot world (land warms faster than oceans. So that 4C is the average of the two) and we won’t be able to sustain our current population. Vast swathes of the planet will be not fit for farming. Especially already arid regions today. So entertaining this world means entertaining the death and suffering of billions.
We are long past the need for “balance”. We need to decarbonize yesterday and it is unfortunate that workers in fossil fuel industries might lose their job along the way. We could do what most climate policy think tanks suggest and provide compensated job training & a guaranteed position for fossil fuel workers transitioning to a cleaner energy field.
