> There is no way you could meaningfully control CO2 emissions of companies as an individual. If you will try to do it, then the companies will optimize for misleading you.
You don't think you can have an impact on your personal CO2 levels by avoiding flying and eating less beef for example (which both have a massive footprint)? How is a company realistically going to mislead you into going for a worse alternative there?
> There are systemic solutions: European Union Emissions Trading System is quite good system.
But why would systemic solutions get suggested or implemented if individuals didn't show they wanted a solution? Where would these initiatives come from if they're not influenced by the voices, voting power and buying power of individuals?
Aviation is responsible for some 3% and whole agriculture for some 10%. Not only you will have very little impact, but it will decrease your life standard. Additionally, you will not convince the whole society to stop flying and to stop eating meat directly. We barely can agree on climate change in the first place.
It is beauty of the free market and capitalism that as the price of CO2 will increase everyone will start looking for ways to reduce emissions without even thinking about emissions. Including innovators and investors.
There is also nice political side of Emissions Trading Schemes. It had no effect when it was introduced and it's impact increases little by little each year. Not everyone who would be opposed realized effects of that system when it was introduced. They are slowly gaining awareness, but the positions have reversed. Now, they have to fight against the status quo.
I see that quite clearly in Poland. Polish coal miners have a lot of political swing, but they did not realize the consequences of Emissions Trading Scheme. Now as the effects are increasing Polish government is not capable of changing it. But they have money from selling emission rights so they can use that money to appease coal miners and other politically important groups.
> But why would systemic solutions get suggested or implemented if individuals didn't show they wanted a solution? Where would these initiatives come from if they're not influenced by the voices, voting power and buying power of individuals?
It's easier to convince people that climate change needs to be addressed than to educate them on how --all-- industries work. E.g. how much do you know about concrete curing, steel and related emissions? Would you be able to make informed decisions with regard to building materials and CO2 emissions? Do you even know if viable alternatives exist? Do you expect companies to spend more to emit less?
"At a global scale, the FAO has recently estimated that livestock (including poultry) accounts for about 14.5 percent of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions estimated as 100-year CO2 equivalents.[60] A previous widely cited FAO report using somewhat more comprehensive analysis had estimated 18 percent"
> There is also nice political side of Emissions Trading Schemes. It had no effect when it was introduced and it's impact increases little by little each year. Not everyone who would be opposed realized effects of that system when it was introduced.
I'm in strong agreement that taxing emissions is the long-term solution but do you not think the collective actions and influence of individuals have had a part in paving the way for solutions like this to appear? Don't companies, products and political parties appear and adapt (however slowly) to meet the needs of individuals?
The story with livestock is complicated. From that same Wikipedia article.
> The indirect effects contributing to the percentage include emissions associated with the production of feed consumed by livestock and carbon dioxide emission from deforestation in Central and South America, attributed to livestock production
So now deforestation is equivalent to livestock? Should I say shopping malls and residential areas are a problem because they require all the plants on the land to be cut down and paved over? I really wish these '% of everything' statistics would go away. It is almost always more complicated which fosters climate skeptics.
Energy production - aka fossil fuel burning such as coal for electricity and gas/diesel for - is the vast majority of emissions. We should be focusing on getting our democratic voting power focused on one that one easily digested story to get things done on a nation-state level instead of getting bogged down in these micro-issues. "Everything causes climate change" is impossible to fix. "Fossil fuels and especially cars and coal" cause climate change is very possible to address.
You don't think you can have an impact on your personal CO2 levels by avoiding flying and eating less beef for example (which both have a massive footprint)? How is a company realistically going to mislead you into going for a worse alternative there?
> There are systemic solutions: European Union Emissions Trading System is quite good system.
But why would systemic solutions get suggested or implemented if individuals didn't show they wanted a solution? Where would these initiatives come from if they're not influenced by the voices, voting power and buying power of individuals?