"The main tangible outcome will be a report...by rockstar academics." Sure, no pressure! But it will be a great #fossilfuel #justtransition conference in Santa Marta! www.theguardian.com/environment/...
I’m not a moderate. I think they should just reset the clock and wipe out all Supreme Court decisions since what 2016?
I’m starting to like this guy.
They have started showing up in Silicon Valley! It’s great
This is using CO2e with 100 year GWP? And where is waste management?
I am very much looking forward to attending this so important 1st Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels. Colombia-The Netherlands 24 to 29 April, Santa Marta, Colombia
It's happening! We're going to start writing the roadmap to transition the world off #fossilfuels. I'm excited to head to Santa Marta Colombia for the first conference on a just transition. (Petrostates not invited).
Exhibit 4721 in why you shouldn’t believe #carboncredits. Or really any #offsets. They’re failures by design.
Just as the closure of the #StraitofHormuz offers us a chance to accelerate the transition away from #fossilfuels, it also offers us a chance to ditch #plastics and other #petrochemicals. apnews.com/article/clim...
More generally, what's his plan for transportation? VMT continues to go up and CARB has no clue what to do.
Bikes and ebikes are the quickest way to get people out of cars, lower gas consumption, reduce costs. Will he support rebates for bikes and ebikes like we had for EVs?
Because they could take down one Democrat for one Republican. Party over country.
I know we're all tapped out of outrage but...we've spent 30 years putting the evil genie of #carboncredits back in the bottle and we're finally gaining traction. Only to be undermined by a so-called environmental group? EDF is on the wrong side of this fight. kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/commentary/b...
Hey @volts.wtf can you do an episode on why it's so hard to build stuff (clean grid, housing, public transit) in the US? We need to hear from people who know (and not the #abundance crowd who think it's all just environmental laws. Other countries have enviro laws and still build stuff).
Wang reminds us that public goods require building things. But which things, and for whom, is as important as the impulse to build. A commitment to equity goes beyond engineers vs. lawyers. 13/13.
Societies that build only for elites lose the consent of the governed, which shows up in ways small and large – including resistance to building new infrastructure. But mostly, the US has stopped trying to build for the majority; it only builds for the wealthy. 12/n
#Gandhi said to judge a society by how it treats its weakest member. My take: #development consists of public goods. A society that provides all with water, power, education, healthcare, transport, access to nature, etc. is developed. Societies that reserve these for the wealthy are not. 11/n
Wang wants China to get a bit more lawyerly to prevent abuses, and the US to embrace engineering and build things. But he doesn’t address differing approaches to inequality, which seem to have at least as much explanatory power. 10/n
Relatedly, the US ditched industrial policy after World War II, eventually resulting in deindustrialization. Now billionaires channel investment for their own benefit. In China, the state directs capital, talent, and energy to industrial sectors that benefit the whole country. 9/n
This is a huge source of social license in China: the government delivers, tangibly, for its people. Since #Reagan, the US gave up trying to make the economy work for most people; inequality has exploded and now a plurality of Americans are ready to “burn it all down.” 8/n
The #CCP takes seriously its commitment to combat inequality. Rather than transfer payments, it builds world class infrastructure in regions too poor to afford it. It also has no compunction taking down billionaires who get too big for their britches. 7/n
#Breakneck also mentions in passing other, equally plausible reasons for the divergence. Wang’s argument would be stronger if he seriously considered these alternatives. 6/n
I have yet to see a solid analysis of why building in the US has become so costly and slow, and it’s badly needed. Pointing to the professional background of policymakers is not convincing. Would leavening the lawyers with more engineers really shift structural conditions? I don’t think so. 5/n
But is it the lawyers’ fault? The US used to be a manufacturing superpower, and lawyers were in charge then. Wang accepts the #abundance argument – too much legality, too many environmental restrictions -- without giving any evidence. 4/n
Lawyers serve as brakes, preventing government abuses but also slowing valuable initiatives. A state dominated by lawyers is a recipe for gridlock. Thus China is good at building and the US isn’t. It’s not news that the US is bad at building needed things (clean grid, housing, public transit). 3/n
Wang’s thesis: #China is run by engineers and the US by lawyers; this explains their different trajectories in recent decades. Engineers build things – infrastructure, cars, consumer goods. They also engineer society, with disastrous results like the one child policy. 2/n
I just finished Dan Wang’s excellent new book #Breakneck about the phenomenal transformation of China into the world’s manufacturing giant. It’s well-written, nuanced and thought-provoking; definitely worth a read. But I don’t find it convincing. 1/n
Finally the menswear guy intersects with my knowledge base!
Some welcome good news and an early indication of #demanddestruction.
Will you please not jinx it??
