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Opinion|Seeking Technological Solutions to the Climate Crisis
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letters
SEEKING TECHNOLOGICAL SOLUTIONS TO THE CLIMATE CRISIS
April 11, 2024
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trials of Donald Trump in New York, Florida, Georgia and Washington, D.C. Get it
sent to your inbox.
MORE FROM OUR INBOX:
* The Jury Trump Wants
* Rejecting Federal Money to Feed Kids
* Cruelty to Chickens
* Creative Disagreement
Image
Credit...Francesca Jones for The New York Times
To the Editor:
Re “Can We Engineer Our Way Out of the Climate Crisis?” (“Buying Time” series,
front page, March 31):
The fact that the fossil fuel industry is seeking to rebrand the concept of
geoengineering with terms that sound more palatable should tell us all we need
to know about the validity of these foolish, unworkable false solutions to our
climate crisis.
“Carbon capture and storage” and “direct air capture” may sound like pleasant,
productive endeavors. But the truth is, they are indeed a wasteful distraction,
doing more harm than good.
Recent analysis from Food & Water Watch indicates that direct air capture is
both preposterously expensive and ultimately pointless. Capturing just a quarter
of our country’s annual carbon dioxide emissions would cost around a trillion
dollars a year — money much better spent on replacing oil and gas power with
clean, renewable alternatives.
And the process of capturing the carbon is extremely energy-intensive itself.
Powering a direct air capture operation via traditional methods would create
over three times more carbon emissions than it actually captured. Meanwhile,
diverting wind and solar energy to run carbon capture facilities would be like
using clean water to power a desalination plant — a wasteful loop of stagnation.
Advertisement
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Unfortunately, there are no fanciful, futuristic escapes from the deepening
crisis we face. There is only this simple fact: In order to avoid the worst of
fossil-fuel-driven climate chaos, we need to quit fossil fuels — quickly.
Wenonah Hauter
Washington
The writer is founder and executive director of Food & Water Watch.
To the Editor:
The issue is not “can we” but “we must” engineer our way out of earth’s climate
crisis.
Only by being smart will we be able to dodge future global-warming-induced
calamities. As a civilization, we need to understand our human limitations and
use technology to mitigate and correct our mistakes and excesses.
A CHANGING CLIMATE, A CHANGING WORLD
Card 1 of 4
Climate change around the world: In “Postcards From a World on Fire,” 193
stories from individual countries show how climate change is reshaping reality
everywhere, from dying coral reefs in Fiji to disappearing oases in Morocco and
far, far beyond.
The role of our leaders: Writing at the end of 2020, Al Gore, the 45th vice
president of the United States, found reasons for optimism in the Biden
presidency, a feeling perhaps borne out by the passing of major climate
legislation. That doesn’t mean there haven’t been criticisms. For example,
Charles Harvey and Kurt House argue that subsidies for climate capture
technology will ultimately be a waste.
The worst climate risks, mapped: In this feature, select a country, and we'll
break down the climate hazards it faces. In the case of America, our maps,
developed with experts, show where extreme heat is causing the most deaths.
What people can do: Justin Gillis and Hal Harvey describe the types of local
activism that might be needed, while Saul Griffith points to how Australia shows
the way on rooftop solar. Meanwhile, small changes at the office might be one
good way to cut significant emissions, writes Carlos Gamarra.
*
*
*
*
We can use our knowledge and engineering skills to address our greenhouse gas
climate crisis by judiciously using carbon capture, storage and recycling. Much
has been said about carbon capture and storage; however, only scant references
to recycling carbon dioxide have been made.
Currently CO₂ has limited industrial uses such as carbonating beverages, aerosol
propellants and fire extinguishing. We need more widespread use of CO₂ so that
industry can help absorb the existing and future generated carbon dioxide.
Advertisement
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We need the widespread use of CO₂ as the raw material for industrial materials
and fuels such as solid carbonate construction materials (cement) and
carbon-neutral fuels such as methanol produced from CO₂ and green hydrogen.
Engineers can reduce the relative amount of carbon dioxide discharged into the
atmosphere and can develop more ways of absorbing the carbon discharged.
Together with the increasing worldwide awareness of the harmful effects of
global warming, this is how we engineer ourselves out of the climate crisis.
Jose Femenia
Oakdale, N.Y.
The writer is a retired professor of marine and mechanical engineering.
THE JURY TRUMP WANTS
Image
The choice of 12 New Yorkers to sit in judgment of the former president will be
among the most important decisions in the trial. Credit...Jefferson Siegel for
The New York Times
To the Editor:
Re “In Trump Criminal Trial, Angling for Jurors Ever So Carefully” (news
article, April 11):
Usually a defendant such as Donald Trump would want to avoid jurors who see his
“hush money” trial as more about sex than about falsifying business records for
electoral gain.
But Mr. Trump has a way of surviving sex scandals — neither the 2016 release of
the “Access Hollywood” tape nor his 2023 sexual abuse conviction have derailed
him so far. So Mr. Trump may prefer jurors who dismiss the Stormy Daniels
alleged affair as just that — another fling fit more for the tabloids than the
courtroom.
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Jeffrey Abramson
Concord, Mass.
The writer is emeritus professor of government at the University of Texas at
Austin and the author of “We, the Jury: The Jury System and the Ideal of
Democracy.”
REJECTING FEDERAL MONEY TO FEED KIDS
Image
After meeting with young people, Gov. Jim Pillen of Nebraska reversed himself
and accepted federal money for summer meals.Credit...Kenneth Ferriera/Lincoln
Journal Star, via Associated Press
To the Editor:
Re “G.O.P. States Split on Taking Summer Food Aid” (front page, April 10):
It is almost impossible to reconcile the degree of cruelty exhibited by
Republican governors who refuse federal aid to feed children from poor families
over the summer. The once-Grand Old Party champions a “pro-life” position and
yet is willing to allow children to go hungry over the summer.
Ten million children who suffer from food insecurity could be damaged by the
Republican Party’s refusal to accept help from a Democratic administration.
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Bill Gottdenker
Mountainside, N.J.
CRUELTY TO CHICKENS
Image
Organic chicken farming methods can help farms be less susceptible to bird flu
outbreaks.Credit...Rachel Bujalski for The New York Times
To the Editor:
Re “A Cruel Way to Control Bird Flu? Poultry Giants Cull and Cash In” (front
page, April 4):
As you report, millions of chickens have been brutally killed on farms across
the country, and American taxpayers are picking up the tab.
The method most frequently used to “depopulate” these animals is particularly
cruel: ventilation shutdown, which slowly kills animals by sealing them in hot
barns and turning off the air to overheat and suffocate them, essentially
cooking them alive.
Industrial agribusinesses could use less painful depopulation methods, or even
reduce the risk of disease spread — to animals and to us — by raising birds in
less crowded conditions. Instead, they keep choosing the cheapest, cruelest,
highest-risk options because they know the government will bail them out.
The Industrial Agriculture Accountability Act would change this, shifting
responsibility onto the multi-billion-dollar corporations that profit from
factory farming.
The bill would require reasonable disaster planning, restrict use of the
cruelest depopulation practices and ensure that when depopulation cannot be
avoided, the corporations controlling the operations and maintaining inherently
inhumane and high-risk systems are the ones covering costs and reimbursing their
contract farmers.
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The A.S.P.C.A. urges Congress to take action and pass this critical legislation
to hold industrial agriculture accountable for its corner cutting so that
animals, farmers and taxpayers are not ultimately paying the price.
Matt Bershadker
New York
The writer is president and C.E.O. of the A.S.P.C.A.
CREATIVE DISAGREEMENT
Image
Credit...Brian Blomerth
To the Editor:
Re “The Value of Collaborating With Adversaries,” by Cass R. Sunstein (Opinion
guest essay, April 3), about Daniel Kahneman, the Nobel economics laureate who
died last month:
Professor Kahneman’s hypothesis that collaborating with your intellectual
adversaries is valuable because it may help you discover a truth that you
wouldn’t have uncovered without such a collaboration is a point well taken —
especially if the effort is undertaken with the best of intentions, not just the
total destruction of your adversary’s thesis (“angry science”).
The idea that this practice can be transferred to our politics would be valuable
if there were a basis of truth that each side could debate and come to some
consensus. But when one party unfortunately is pretty much fact-free and riddled
in conspiracy theories it’s a futile exercise. It can be attempted, but I would
not expect much in the way of results.
Carol Lawlor
North Wales, Pa.
A version of this article appears in print on April 12, 2024, Section A, Page 25
of the New York edition with the headline: Seeking Solutions to the Climate
Crisis. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe
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