• TanyaJLaird@beehaw.org
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    2 days ago

    Honestly, this all seems like small potatoes. We’re trying to save our species from extinction here. We’re trying to maintain the standard of living that came with the Industrial Revolution without burning out planet to a cinder.

    If doing so means our steel industry runs 10% less efficiently, I really don’t give a damn.

    • TranquilTurbulence@lemmy.zip
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      2 days ago

      I don’t know exactly how bad would it be, but my guess is that it would have a significant impact on the prices consumer pay for everything. In the past few hundred years, we’ve taken all sorts of nasty shortcuts that have allowed us to produce things at very low prices. If you want to do things the right way, it’s going to cost much more.

      Burning fossil fuels is just one of those unwise shortcuts that need to be reversed completely. In the long run, we’re going to have to bury all the carbon we’ve dug up, and that’s going to be incredibly expensive too.

      Fortunately though, the downsides of intermittent energy production can still be mitigated with various grid energy storage technologies. The way I see it, investing into them is crucial.