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Earth

Three Americans Create Enough Carbon Emissions To Kill One Person, Study Finds (theguardian.com) 216

Posted by msmash from the closer-look dept.
The lifestyles of around three average Americans will create enough planet-heating emissions to kill one person, and the emissions from a single coal-fired power plant are likely to result in more than 900 deaths, according to the first analysis to calculate the mortal cost of carbon emissions. From a report: The new research builds upon what is known as the "social cost of carbon," a monetary figure placed upon the damage caused by each ton of carbon dioxide emissions, by assigning an expected death toll from the emissions that cause the climate crisis. The analysis draws upon several public health studies to conclude that for every 4,434 metric tons of CO2 pumped into the atmosphere beyond the 2020 rate of emissions, one person globally will die prematurely from the increased temperature. This additional CO2 is equivalent to the current lifetime emissions of 3.5 Americans.

Adding a further 4m metric tons above last year's level, produced by the average US coal plant, will cost 904 lives worldwide by the end of the century, the research found. On a grander scale, eliminating planet-heating emissions by 2050 would save an expected 74 million lives around the world this century. The figures for expected deaths from the release of emissions aren't definitive and may well be "a vast underestimate" as they only account for heat-related mortality rather than deaths from flooding, storms, crop failures and other impacts that flow from the climate crisis, according to Daniel Bressler of Columbia University's Earth Institute, who wrote the paper.
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Three Americans Create Enough Carbon Emissions To Kill One Person, Study Finds More

Three Americans Create Enough Carbon Emissions To Kill One Person, Study Finds

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  • One American consumes enough to kill .3 Americans. But if we don't care that much about our own selves then expecting us to give a shit about anyone else is a bit pointless. Potentially sketchy calculations aside does this present a viable solution? If not then it's just as pointless. It's just the green version of a Fox/CNN outrage bait to get your blood up.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by PPH ( 736903 )

      Emissions are global in effect. Those .3 killed are not necessarily Americans*. So it's all good.

      *Central Americans would be OK.

      • Perhaps you missed the jab at the fact that we have what's described as an obesity epidemic in the country and it's hardly anything new. Our emissions aren't killing others any faster than we're killing our selves over what I consider a far more easily solved problem. That we haven't managed to solve that, let alone prevent it from getting worse should tell you everything you need to know about the possibility of solving this other issue.

    • I took the point to be that Americans are innovative and can manufacture things. They could generate less CO2 per person and at the same time cut their heating/cooling bills.

  • Stupid math (Score:5, Insightful)

    by gurps_npc ( 621217 ) on Friday July 30, 2021 @04:55PM (#61639665) Homepage

    So, they estimate how much carbon Americans put out over their life time, then look at what percentage of people will die because of global warming, then figure out how much carbon will create that global warming. Then do the math, dividing by number of Americans.

    Problem is any of the following will increase the amount of people killed:

    1) Higher world wide population
    2) Higher carbon
    3) Lower number of Americans.

    Basically, this study says more about over-population and the relatively small percent of people being America than about how much carbon Americans produce.

    • Re:Stupid math (Score:5, Interesting)

      by tafep88188 ( 8451847 ) on Friday July 30, 2021 @04:58PM (#61639681)
      They guy who did this "study" is just a student at Columbia University, Danny Bressler, who used to intern at The Onion. I wouldn't take it seriously. It was just posted here and at The Guardian for clickbait, because that is what passes for "studies" and "journalism" in 2021.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Entrope ( 68843 )

      So you're saying someone sent him a copy of this book: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] ?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      How will a lower number of Americans kill more people?

      • How will a lower number of Americans kill more people?

        Because the number of Americans is in the denominator. A smaller number means a bigger total of deaths per American.

        If there were zero Americans, then each would cause an infinite number of deaths.

        TFA mathematically proves that Americans are terrible people.

    • Basically, this study says more about over-population and the relatively small percent of people being America than about how much carbon Americans produce.

      I don't understand why it makes sense to blame overpopulation when the difference in CO2 production between US and poorest countries is over 150x per person.

  • The point of the article is that even with American lifestyle, it is a MINOR contribution to our GHG. In fact, they found that taking out a small number of coal plants( IIRC, 20 ), would reduce emissions more than if we zero out all of America. It comes down to stopping fossil fuel, but most of all, Coal must be stopped. When 20 coal plants from around the world produce the single largest amount, and nations like Germany, Poland, India, Indonesia, America, but ESP CHINA, refuse to shut these Down, well, we
  • But how many people would die pedaling bicycle generators to power my house and recharge my car's batteries?
  • Who are those three lowlifes? :-)

  • Oh fuck no (Score:4, Interesting)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Friday July 30, 2021 @05:00PM (#61639701)
    this is not good science communication. Fuck whoever came up with this study. The climate change deniers are going to have a field day with this.

    This study has to have been commissioned by the oil industry. This is exactly the kind of thing that'll put people into a defensive posture and get them opposed to fighting climate change.

    Politics 101 is that when you're trying to convince people to do something against their interests (in this case, tackle climate change so we don't all run out of food and water) you make them feel like they're under attack. That's exactly what this will do.

  • People are terrible with numbers, averages, and long term problems. That's why we have smokers.

    Imagine if 1 out of 10,000 cigarettes just exploded and blew your head off rather than giving you cancer. There wouldn't be a single smoker anywhere.

  • The actual paper is sensational (Score:5, Informative)

    by phantomfive ( 622387 ) on Friday July 30, 2021 @05:05PM (#61639731) Journal

    Here's a link to the actual paper [nature.com]. The actual explanation of how they calculated the deaths is hidden pretty deeply, and involves statistical tricks like taking the first derivative.

    The bulk of the paper is talking about the policy implications of what would happen if carbon emissions actually killed that many people. It isn't the worst paper I've read in Nature.

  • A better way of looking at it: one selfish person likely destroys the environment than several others.

  • As an American I have a couple of questions. First if I can get two other Americans to help me create enough carbon, can I pick who I can kill? Because, I can make a quick list of both people to help me and people that I'd like to kill. Second question, what if I only want to maim them? Does it take two other people, or can I just do that by myself?

  • If we're really concerned about three Americans killing one person with carbon, if we can identify who this three Americans are then we should be able to stop them.

  • We just gotta find those 3 people and stop them.

  • I take this it is some sort of average because i believe some areas are "cleaner" than others for example struggling to think of any coal power plants in my area, any power plants I know of around me are 2 Hydroelectric dams on the Rock river and the Nuclear Plant in Byron, Illinois. also, some Americans are "cleaner" than others, for example I haven't driven since I got out of the army 15 years ago. To get around my small town, I use an electric bike. Ironically the chose was not out of environmental conc

  • Ok lets do some quick stats (Score:5, Informative)

    by wakeboarder ( 2695839 ) on Friday July 30, 2021 @05:29PM (#61639883)

    300million Americans = 100million deaths round the world. Just a quick esitmate gives about 300k deaths worldwide/yr https://ourworldindata.org/gra... [ourworldindata.org] .

    So, maybe it will take 100million/300k= 334 years for these stats to complete, or they are completely bogus. Plus the numbers I have are considering ALL natural disasters, I'm assuming that weather related disasters would be from climate change (and deaths from natural disasters are going down in time because we can warn people better). Somebody discredit the people who came up with this poor research.

    Also most coal plants in the US have scrubbers that prevent most of the contaminates from going to the air, China an India do not and have much poorer air quality

  • and is thus likely sensationalist junk science.. You have to consider the source of these kinds of reports.

  • Peeing is more dangerous (Score:4, Insightful)

    by GLowder ( 622780 ) on Friday July 30, 2021 @05:37PM (#61639919)
    You can also pee enough into a cup to drown someone, that's 1:1.
  • In the end everyone dies.

  • Now do China (Score:2, Insightful)

    by ASCIIxTended ( 4777373 )

    China accounts for over 50 percent of the total global electricity generation by coal. The US is only 11 percent - the same as India. Splitting this usage data up by individual person is stupid - every country will use far more power for industrial applications that residential.

    https://www.statista.com/stati... [statista.com]

  • AGW is real, the physics is sound. That being said, we haz us a load of bullshit here.

    Okay - who was killed? With 332,987,277 million 'Murricans, that's a lot of people we killed. 110,995,759 in fact. but maybe a million here or there difference. Seems like the world population problems are fixed!

    Now do China!

  • three average Americans will create enough planet-heating emissions to kill one person,

    If the three of them manage to kill another American, the problem may fix itself.

  • I create enough baseball bat emissions to kill a person. You should do a study on that, punk.
  • Its a BIG difference.

    Quote: he analysis draws upon several public health studies to conclude that for every 4,434 metric tons of CO2 pumped into the atmosphere beyond the 2020 rate of emissions, one person globally will die prematurely from the increased temperature. This additional CO2 is equivalent to the current lifetime emissions of 3.5 Americans.

    Need to understand it in terms of lost person-years of life, not "premature deaths". If the emissions cause a person to die 1 second early that is rat

  • I can't wait to see how many people one Chinese person kills...

    Hrm...

  • While it takes just 3.5 Americans to create enough emissions in a lifetime to kill one person, it would take 25 Brazilians or 146 Nigerians to do the same, the paper found.

    So, if we assume the average "American" lives 80 years, that means it takes 240 years of energy consumption to kill one person - of climate-related causes.

    Question: How will we know when someone dies for Climate-related reasons, or are we to just take this as accepted fact and nod in agreement as politicians parrot this claim to justify Trillions in climate-related projects?

  • Yeah right. (Score:3)

    by jdawgnoonan ( 718294 ) on Friday July 30, 2021 @11:27PM (#61640789)
    This has the distinct smell of bullshit. You just have to love cooked up numbers from "Science" that you can't argue with because the "Science is In".

  • Just the air you breathe out has enough carbon to kill you, and another three people besides. I don't even know what this title means.

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