Finally, corporations are jumping into action on climate change — or at least that’s what they’d like us to believe. Many of the world’s biggest and most polluting companies have recently promised to curb their carbon output, by reaching net-zero emissions in the next few decades. These sweeping pledges conjure a world where we can have it all: economic growth and global trade — without the global warming that usually comes with that. While saving the planet demands an approach more ambitious than incremental change, these corporate fantasies of the future just don’t stand up to scrutiny. In a new @nytopinon video, we expose three major flaws in net-zero pledges that make them a dangerous distraction from the crisis at hand.
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Hi, I'm Agnes, a reporter with Opinion Video. I'm also an environmental scientist, so I’ve been following how governments and corporations say they're going to tackle climate change for years. When so many companies started committing to “net zero” greenhouse gas emissions, I was initially excited. It seemed like after years of talk, we might finally see some action. But when I looked into how these corporations say they actually plan to reach “net zero,” I realized these pledges don’t stand up to scrutiny. In this Opinion video, we explain the three major reasons why. If you have any questions, or if you have thoughts about whether it's possible to reach net zero emissions goals, I’d love to hear them! Let me know in the comments below.
What you can do: stop eating meat, drive/fly as little as possible, don't buy things you don't need, don't invest in polluting corporations, plant your own vegetable garden, work from home, do your research, care for yourself and your planet, boycott big greedy corporations as much as possible, vote for green candidates.
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By 2040 no one may even be here..these losers
You do realize corporations can’t change things overnight right? Becoming net zero by 2030 or 2040 requires an immense amount of change for the company that you SHOULD be happy with!
I my opinion your video has a too static, negative and non-helpful view. Sure it is yet too far out, and not good enough. But it is a step! So let's appreciate that and go further: Analyse those reports, ask for more, ask for faster and make it visible. The biggest thread to the climate so far was that nobody even knew what companies contribute to the problem, not even the companies then, and still not now. So we need to advance with software that can at least start to tell us what is happening and improve from there on. What did your video even suggest to really do better in a world where cooperations are rigid and change takes effort.
The real dynamic behind all this is that money is an insideous unstoppable force, while also being the root of all civilization. I myself am not willing to give up half of my net worth to battle climate change, are you? Very few are willing to throw their money into what seems to be a black hole, the effectiveness of which you will never be sure of, to benefit people 50 years down the line. (Of course, if you are a self-righteous young person, you will be the most vocal and condemning, and that's easy, because you have little to lose.)
No, what's going to happen will be a slow-motion disaster, playing out over the coming decades, with diseases, famine, war –probably not an apocolypse mind you, but population-decreasing nonetheless. Some will adapt, some will die, as it has always been, until an equilibrium is found. Humanity can't yet regulate itself entirely, so nature will do it for us.
Well duh. When faced with an unreachable goal in an unachievable timeline of course they’re going to scam to shut people up and then just hope someone has a workable solution in the future. I see lots of finger pointing but I don’t see anyone coming up with a solution that’s workable right now that isn’t going to cause chaos. In the meantime there’s some simple things they could do that they don’t seem to want to. Like how about legislating that for every white-collar worker who CAN they MUST work from home two days a week – that’s quite a few cars off the road each week and an easy emissions reduction. The lockdowns proved it can work. Or legislating unnecessary plastic packaging out of existence. Everyone hates those molded plastic packages you often get in stores. Or hey, Amazon, how about you don’t put that tiny charging cable I just bought in that massive cardboard box? Or perhaps we stop buying cheap junk and start making things that last again like in ye olden days.
Climate change propaganda… That’s against climate change propaganda
Climate Change is a non-linear problem that is beginning to produce brutally harsh non-linear pressure on Businesses, Governments and every Citizen on Earth to solve using genuine approaches, instead of the financial accounting artifice of Net-Zero by 20XX. Humans don’t typically notice non-linear changes at first, but they will definitely notice increasingly more every single year.
The NYT is not a reliable source. Correction: They ARE a reliable source of propaganda.
We are so boned…
Not a single viable solution or path proposed. Perhaps giving us some insights would help?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SiCvGQnweAg
It’s funny how you can steal a kids toy and you’re in jail for years but corporations who literally destroyed our planet just get a little warning and no punishment
I don't understand these titles. How do you debunk something with an opinion piece? It can't be both a debunk and an opinion piece at the same time
I am from India and I love your reporting style…
Thank you for presenting a compact, convincing and necessary opinion! This needs to be widely seen.
Happy to see animal agriculture being the very first thing to be mentioned. Most journalists choose to ignore the role of animal ag on the climate.
According to researchers from the University of Oxford, even if we stopped all fossil fuel emissions right now, the temperatures would still keep rising unless we change our diets. Why? Animal agriculture emits lots of methane, a GHG far worse than CO2, and is the main driver of deforestation and eutrophication. The fishing industry is destroying the oceans, when oceans absorb more carbon than all trees of the planet. If we don't adopt a plant-based food system, animal ag and the fishing industries will keep destroying the mechanisms that allow the planet to eliminate CO2 from the atmosphere.
Until we don't change our diets and demand governments to stop funding the animal agriculture and fishing industries, no amount of renewable energy will save our planet.
You all forgot what you learned in third grade. Think for yourself. Climate change is a LIE. We have millions of years of climate data. Not 35. Plus several hundred years of written climate data. Not 35.
They've been saying the world will end for decades and have been wrong every time. but sure let's believe them this time they definitely don't have any ulterior motives this time around.
Can't they realize that the future exists and that we should at least have a good future, not a hellish one?
Remember, if you want to fix a problem, just scream at rich people and say it's all their fault. That always works.
Exactly.
Thirty years ago I was told the end of the world was now , and all we got was people crazily going around in paper masks … and complaining .
This is the NYT , right ? Tell me when New York will have a net zero something ….
We should incentivise not having children. 7 or 8 billion people is too much. Even 1 billion would be way more than enough. The problem is that even if new children would stop being born it would take too long before the old generations would pass away to reduce the population enough. But the decline of population would probably cause economic crisis so people would likely change their mind and start having children again. I think this system is flawed from the grounds. It probably cant be fixed. The population will continue to grow until its unsustainable and then everything is doomed.
We have been lied to, there is no "Climate Crisis"…… "Global warming" increases at the same rate as "Global warming" research funding. Walk outside, breath deeply, soak in the sun, and take a kid fishing.