from Hacker News

Our car-free future will be blocked by Comcast tactics

by fluxic on 11/3/18, 10:46 PM with 1 comments

• by gotocake on 11/4/18, 12:34 AM

  Actually it will be blocked because most people don’t want a “car free future” in the first place, they want cars. It’s sort of like people who talk about a meatless future, who forget that not everyone shares their desires. It’s also worth pointing out that while cars certainly contribute to turning Earth into a “hellbiscuit” as you say, they’re not the major driving force. The energy sector, industrial activity, forestry and agriculture, account for 80% of greenhouse gas emissions. Transportation from trains to ships, plains, trucks and commuter cars is 14%. Now the numbers do change depending on source, and in some cases transportation can be as high as 20%, ~60% of which is from cars.

  If everyone on Earth gave up their cars, we’d still be heading facefirst into the proverbial wall where climate change is concerned. It would certainly help if we could switch a lot of fossil fuel burning to clean sources of energy, and switch to EV’s powered by that clean energy. That’s going to take a lot of work, but it’s probably doable. Just telling people they’re evil for wanting a car isn’t. Most of all though, don’t fool yourself into thinking that we have the time to wait for a “car free future” or that it’s the most obvious and powerful inflection point to alter the course of global emissions. Switching from mining and burning coal, oil, and gas is, and that will almost certainly require a combination of renewables and nuclear. Short of that, we’re fucked.