Collapse

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This is the place for discussing the potential collapse of modern civilization and the environment.

Collapse, in this context, refers to the significant loss of an established level or complexity towards a much simpler state. It can occur differently within many areas, orderly or chaotically, and be willing or unwilling. It does not necessarily imply human extinction or a singular, global event. Although, the longer the duration, the more it resembles a ‘decline’ instead of collapse.

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Sally Rooney: When are we going to have the courage to stop the climate crisis? (www.irishtimes.com)

submitted 4 months ago by hanrahan@slrpnk.net to c/collapse@lemm.ee

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If fossil fuels keep burning at present rates, we are headed for apocalyptic civilisational collapse. Perhaps even more strangely, there is no longer much serious disagreement about this claim.

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[–] HakFoo@lemmy.sdf.org 5 points 4 months ago

Things will change the exact second that existing petro-wealth figures out how to make more off of green power in the next quarter than by continuing to destroy the earth. I wonder if, ironically, that day will be highly delayed because they missed the opportunity to buy in at the bottom.

Everyone could see that greentech would be a trillion dollar industry. If nothing else, nobody after 1950 ever pictured oil derricks in their sci-fi worlds. So you'd expect the firms that already knew energy-- the oil companies and utilities-- to take a speculative punt on every new tech just as they'd buy into new oil-fields.

But I guess a dollar reinvested in the goo industry in 1980 was the sure thing-- worth more than the chance to own a chunk of the new economy in 2040. Will ExxonMobil or Shell be willing to pivot into solar/hydrogen/battery/etc tech at today's prices, or will they just use their political leverage to maximize the extraction and damage thry can do with their assets until they become complete write-offs?