We have to understand the problem to understand the solution. In the case of climate change, it’s one umbrella problem with many, many different contributing parts.
PROBLEM: Emissions
Greenhouse Gas Emissions By Top Emitters
SOLUTIONS
Solutions fall under two main categories:
1. Reduce Sources — bringing emissions to zero
2. Support Sinks — uplifting nature’s carbon cycle.
- Electricity
- Renewable energy: Wind, Solar, Nuclear, Hydroelectric, Geothermal, Biomass (from plants). In the US, the renewable solution with the highest potential for impact is in wind power. The wind-energy potential of just three states — Kansas, North Dakota, and Texas — would be sufficient to meet electricity demand from coast to coast. In other parts of the world, solar farms have massive potential. Some researchers predict it could rise from two percent of the global electricity mix to meet 20 percent of global energy needs by 2027, especially if supplemented at scale with rooftop solar.
- Increase efficiency: Lighten the load of electricity consumption with more energy-efficient lights, machinery, technology, etc.
- Improve energy transmission: Effective long-distance transmission lines so that countries that overproduce renewable energy (like Morocco with solar) can export it to other countries without it going to waster
- Improve energy storage: If you can capture electricity from renewables during its high-production hours and store it to be used later, you don’t have to dip into the grid during those off-hours
- Renewable energy: Wind, Solar, Nuclear, Hydroelectric, Geothermal, Biomass (from plants). In the US, the renewable solution with the highest potential for impact is in wind power. The wind-energy potential of just three states — Kansas, North Dakota, and Texas — would be sufficient to meet electricity demand from coast to coast. In other parts of the world, solar farms have massive potential. Some researchers predict it could rise from two percent of the global electricity mix to meet 20 percent of global energy needs by 2027, especially if supplemented at scale with rooftop solar.
- Refrigerants
- Phase Out HFCs: Refrigerants, specifically chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs), are thousands of times more damaging to the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. They were key culprits in depleting the ozone layer, and they were phased out in 1987. But many are still in circulation, and must be disposed of properly to limit the emissions impact. Of all climate solutions, Drawdown ranks this #1 in actual, bang-for-your-buck impact.
- Phase Out HFCs: Refrigerants, specifically chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs), are thousands of times more damaging to the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. They were key culprits in depleting the ozone layer, and they were phased out in 1987. But many are still in circulation, and must be disposed of properly to limit the emissions impact. Of all climate solutions, Drawdown ranks this #1 in actual, bang-for-your-buck impact.
- Food/Agriculture
- Reduce Food Waste: ⅓ of the world’s food supply is wasted every year. If wasted food were a country, it would be the third largest producer of carbon dioxide in the world, after the U.S. and China. The food we waste contributes 4.4 gigatons of CO2-equivalent into the atmosphere each year — roughly eight percent of total anthropogenic greenhouse-gas emissions.
- Silvopasture: In Brazil and elsewhere, ranching is a driver of mass deforestation. Cattle and other ruminants require 30 to 45 percent of the world’s arable land, and livestock produce a huge amount of emissions. Silvopasture is the integration of trees into pasture.
- Shade-grown crops: This is similar to silvopasture except that it means integrating taller trees into fields with crops such as cocoa and coffee
- Adoption of a plant-rich diet: The most conservative estimates suggest that raising livestock accounts for nearly 15 percent of global greenhouse gases emitted each year; the most comprehensive assessments of direct and indirect emissions say more than 50 percent.
- Reduce Food Waste: ⅓ of the world’s food supply is wasted every year. If wasted food were a country, it would be the third largest producer of carbon dioxide in the world, after the U.S. and China. The food we waste contributes 4.4 gigatons of CO2-equivalent into the atmosphere each year — roughly eight percent of total anthropogenic greenhouse-gas emissions.
- Economics
- Concessional finance: Below market rate finance provided by major financial institutions, such as development banks and multilateral funds, to developing countries to accelerate development objectives.
- Government subsidies: When governments subsidize renewable energy and other green practices, it makes them more feasible and shifts jobs away from fossil fuel industries and toward greener industries
- Green investments: Convince investors that sustainable businesses are worthy investments. Socially responsible investing has become a buzzy topic, with green investment portfolios and funds on the rise.
- Concessional finance: Below market rate finance provided by major financial institutions, such as development banks and multilateral funds, to developing countries to accelerate development objectives.
- Education
- Educate girls: Decoupling economic growth from emissions at the required scale—and doing it fast enough—is a tall order, especially considering expected population growth. This makes family planning hugely important, and one of the best ways to curb population growth is to educate girls and young women around the globe.
- Informing the public: The more people are aware of the trajectory we are currently on, the more public sentiment will turn toward supporting green policies and businesses, and that consumer/constituent behavior will make it politically and financially expedient to court their favor
- Educate girls: Decoupling economic growth from emissions at the required scale—and doing it fast enough—is a tall order, especially considering expected population growth. This makes family planning hugely important, and one of the best ways to curb population growth is to educate girls and young women around the globe.
- Transportation
- Encourage mass transit: Governments can improve and subsidize access to public transit infrastructure like bikes, subways, etc.
- Transition to electric vehicles. The transportation sector is a large and diverse sector that encompasses road, aviation, rail, and marine transport: both the movement of passengers and movement of goods. 45 percent of total transportation emissions came from passenger vehicles, 29 percent from road freight vehicles, 12 percent from aviation, 11 percent from international shipping, less than 1 percent from rail, and the final 2 percent from other sources. So a transition to EV at scale would be massively impactful.
- Fuel efficiency. When transporting people and things at scale in our globalized world, more efficient use of fuel in aviation, shipping, etc. can go a long way to reduce emissions
- Encourage mass transit: Governments can improve and subsidize access to public transit infrastructure like bikes, subways, etc.
- Environmental restoration/carbon sequestering
- Restore forests: In recent decades, forests have suffered extensive clearing, fragmentation, degradation, and depletion of flora and fauna. Once blanketing 12 percent of the world’s land masses, tropical forests now cover just five percent. When we lose forests, primarily to agricultural expansion or human settlement, we lose the “lungs of the world”
- Bamboo production: Fast-growing bamboo rapidly sequesters carbon in biomass and soil and can thrive on degraded lands. Long-lived bamboo products can store carbon over time.
- Coastal wetland protection: Mangroves, salt marshes, and seagrasses sequester huge amounts of carbon in plants and soil. Protecting them inhibits degradation and safeguards their carbon sinks.
- Restore forests: In recent decades, forests have suffered extensive clearing, fragmentation, degradation, and depletion of flora and fauna. Once blanketing 12 percent of the world’s land masses, tropical forests now cover just five percent. When we lose forests, primarily to agricultural expansion or human settlement, we lose the “lungs of the world”
Drawdown is a great resource on this stuff, and they tend to rank solutions in two ways: ones aimed at the biggest carbon problems, and solutions that can have the biggest immediate impact.
Their top 10 solutions, ranked in terms of emissions reduction potential over a 30-year period: https://www.kosmosjournal.org/news/drawdown-top-10-solutions-to-reverse-climate-change/
Drawdown’s full list of solutions: https://www.drawdown.org/solutions