Leo on Warpcast

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Leo pfp

Putting an oil guy in charge of energy is going to push oil production up, prices down, and renewables out. From foreign policy to climate change, Americans chose America over the world. Can’t hugely blame them, but other countries are not taking the same route. That said, if, like me, you believe the learning curve of renewables is going to make solar much better on price than a barrel of oil in the near future, this isn’t terrible news. But Trump is pushing that timeline out by a few years, and a few years is meaningful when you acknowledge how much damage extreme weather events are causing around the world. If you push oil prices down by a few dollars, but you get one extra hurricane which causes $50bn in damage, is it even worth it?

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Dan Romero pfp

Carbon emissions declined during the first Trump presidency. https://www.climatechangenews.com/2020/10/06/us-emissions-four-years-president-trump/

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Thanks for the link, two points from it The IEA is quoted as “can the US do more? Definitely. Can the US be a leader of the global energy transition? Definitely. So therefore the US politics will matter more.” And this is largely due to the general trend away from fossil fuels, which nonetheless slowed down Generally the article is critical of Trump on climate; maybe because it’s biased, but still: overall this article makes me more confident in my view of ‘Trump is bad for climate, so thank god solar is getting so cheap’ Is there anything Trump did with the purpose of improving the climate? This is what would change my mind

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The primary cause in emissions dropping during that period was moving from coal to natural gas.

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