this post was submitted on 20 Nov 2023
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[–] [email protected] 59 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Through the corporations they own, billionaires emit a million times more carbon than the average person. They tend to favour investments in heavily polluting industries, like fossil fuels.

This is not a billionaire's climate emissions.

[–] [email protected] 42 points 10 months ago (7 children)

If the car I own tallies onto my carbon footprint, surely the corporations owned by the billionaires enjoy the same designation.

They're no different because of what they own.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (2 children)

You would have to take a look at who the stakeholders are at each company. Corporate "ownership" isn't the same as sole proprietorship.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago

Did you read the article at all?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

They all get to enjoy the responsibility (as they all shared the benefits).

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (6 children)

Yeah - at best they are morally responsible for not choosing to invest in something else but in the end as long as there's capitalism and people are creating demand for whatever polluting thing they procude someone else will step in

The Demand has to be slashed by making those products less profitable if the general public is not acting in their own interest because polluting is cheaper and more comfortable

Especially if people are just going directly to "eat the rich" after articles like this I really wonder what they think will happen if the oil-production is stopped completely from one day to the next? And that even assumes that noone will step up to continue the production - what if the state takes over the oil-company and spreads the emissions evenly among every citizen - would that solve the problem of climate change in their minds?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

capitalism and people are creating demand for whatever polluting thing they procude someone else will step in

Capitalism is not why people like electricity, food, and entertainment. All of those things predate capitalism. The USSR contributed to climate change.

Anyone trying to make climate change a leftist issue is a moron. Every economic policy would contribute to climate change becaus every economic policy needs to guarantee heat, food, transport, etc.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago (3 children)

I think there’s one big difference here: the capital holding class has fought tooth and nail against making solutions viable. They’ve pushed pro fossil fuel propaganda into everything from our commutes to schools. They’ve fought against acknowledgement of the realities of climate change and done nothing to try to move towards a more sustainable future, instead choosing to invest in lobbying against solutions to reduce demand such as carbon taxes, reduction of oil subsidies, increases in clean energy subsidies, and mass transit.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

But it does make a title that gets clicks.

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[–] [email protected] 41 points 10 months ago

“These people have an outsize political influence because of their enormous wealth, which they use to leverage local and national governments, gaining exemptions from taxes and privileges that allow them to pollute and to influence laws regulating pollution,” said Wilk, a professor of anthropology at Indiana University. “If you look at them as entities, some of them are rivalling states in terms of their influence.”

God. It makes me so fucking mad.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (6 children)

I wonder if there's some simple way to completely halt the emissions from those twelve.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 10 months ago

I can think of only one (or twelve, depending on how you look at it)

[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

End carbon emissions with this one strange ~~trick~~ brick!

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

The carbon footprints of the investments were calculated by examining the equity stakes that the billionaires held in companies. Estimates of the carbon impact of their holdings was calculated using the company’s declarations on scope 1 emissions – direct emissions from sources owned or controlled by a company – and scope 2, indirect emissions.

Scope 2 emissions are those from the products sold by the company. For example, if you fill your car up at Exxon, the emissions from you driving on that tank of gas is part of Exxon's scope 2 emissions. The fossil fuel industry is mostly scope 2 emissions, while a company like Amazon is mostly scope 1 emissions.

(The Gates foundation has $1.4 billion invested in fossil fuel companies like BP)[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/mar/19/gates-foundation-has-14bn-in-fossil-fuels-investments-guardian-analysis]. If you look at that article, Gates has the second- highest carbon footprint on that list of billionaires. Reading that article, it seems very likely that Gate's emissions are mostly scope 2.

Completely halting Gates emissions, as calculated this way, would involve just shutting down whatever percentage of BP he owns. Gas prices would get higher, without actually solving any of the underlying issues causing that demand, like car-centric urban design. It'd likely do nothing, as other gas companies would start to pump more in the medium term and emissions would quickly go back up.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Minor correction, scope 2 emissions are indirect emissions from the use of purchased energy (generally electricity). What you are describing (driving your car that was filled at Exxon) is scope 3 emissions for Exxon.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I hope it's a delicious way!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

The secret's in the sauce....

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (35 children)

I think the message that want to be passed by this article is probably pro-oil industry. It gives a false impression that we could tackle ecology not by changing our habits but just be mad at a few billionaires. And this is factually false.

Unlike wealth pollution is more equitably shared among people. Here in order to demultiply the calculated pollution of billionaires they introduced thier industry and the pollution of their employees somehow.

And while it is expected these people pollute more. Getting rid of them will not reduce the pollution as one could expect.

unfortunately everyone, even not the wealthiest will need to change how they live to have a visible impact on pollution. broadly speeking, not just CO2, as we have a lot more ecological problems than global warming. Note the focus on global warming alone is also a strategy to hide the real changes that need to ne made in order to prevent humanity to hurt itself too much by destroying its own ecosystem.

Edit: As I am being downvoted it looks people probably misunderstood my message. I would gladly get rid of super rich people. But while this would help, we would all still need to make efforts. Until we accept that we should change our way of life, we will not solve our balance with our ecosystem.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago

I think the message that want to be passed by this article is probably pro-oil industry.

It's not even that

They specifically say that the numbers wouldn't be this skewed if you didn't count their companies as their own personal emissions.

It's just a stupid article all around.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago (1 children)

We all know the solution. It’s only 12 of them. It can’t be that difficult.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

Can't wait to be rid of Taylor swift music

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago

Good luck finding any resources to do a damn thing about it.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago

2.1 mili homes

I'm... quite sure they do worse than that.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I'd be interested in knowing how much more emissions come specifically from private plane owners. Not just billionaires, but celebrities that use their planes to fly short distances

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Roughly 0%. The combined total of all air traffic, 6 million flyers every day, is about 2% of emissions

All private plane use is going to be a tiny percentage of that already small percentage.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

That seems way too low...

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