"Together, we know that driving progress on addressing climate change is what's best for the economic health, jobs, and competitiveness of our companies and our country."
Or, to put it another way, "We've figured out a way to make money out of adopting this proposed change, so we're all for it!"
Exactly. Despite all the doomsayers we hear out of the Alberta oil patch, the White House, and from other people with a vested interest in polluting, it is possible to run a profitable business green. The green economy is the future. People can either join in it or keep making buggy whips and whining about how their jobs are disappearing.
Yes, it’s too bad for the hundreds of thousands of workers who will be put out of a job because Ottawa and Quebec would rather import their oil and gas from Russia.
The blind righteousness of the climate change crowd exemplifies “the road to hell is paved with good intentions.” When you intentionally put your own countrymen out of gainful employment in preference for an autocratic regime that will happily continue to export oil and gas for all its worth, it seems to be an Ethics 101 fail.
Does Canada even have an energy policy that is self sustaining?
"Together, we know that driving progress on addressing climate change is what's best for the economic health, jobs, and competitiveness of our companies and our country."
Or, to put it another way, "We've figured out a way to make money out of adopting this proposed change, so we're all for it!"
Exactly. Despite all the doomsayers we hear out of the Alberta oil patch, the White House, and from other people with a vested interest in polluting, it is possible to run a profitable business green. The green economy is the future. People can either join in it or keep making buggy whips and whining about how their jobs are disappearing.
Yes, it’s too bad for the hundreds of thousands of workers who will be put out of a job because Ottawa and Quebec would rather import their oil and gas from Russia.
The blind righteousness of the climate change crowd exemplifies “the road to hell is paved with good intentions.” When you intentionally put your own countrymen out of gainful employment in preference for an autocratic regime that will happily continue to export oil and gas for all its worth, it seems to be an Ethics 101 fail.
Does Canada even have an energy policy that is self sustaining?
Way to totally miss the point. Alberta could be a leader in solar, and wind, and geothermal, and biomass. But it won’t until it gets the idea out of its head that it is oil country only. The same goes for Texas, the same goes for most of the world. I WANT our fellow Canadians in Alberta to be prosperous, and I can see the handwriting is on the wall for oil. The trouble is that for political reasons the leaders there refuse to accept what is blindingly obvious to the rest of us.
A century ago Canada was a world leader in asbestos production. Even after it was clear that it killed people, Canada didn’t stop production to send to third world countries, where it was killing people. It was only a few years ago that they finally closed the last mine, and the town dependant on it has not yet recovered. I fear that Alberta is going to follow the same path. Keep producing what they know, be unwilling to change, and then be crushed when the market isn’t there any more. Alberta, has a chance to make a smooth transition. Over the next decade it could eliminate oil production from the tar sands and move onto other more profitable industries. The question is do they have the foresight to do it.
As an old pilot told me years ago, when you have an emergency you have a choice, go down in a controlled fashion, or fight to stay in the air as long as you can and then have an uncontrolled crash. That is the choice oil producing states, provinces, and countries have. It will be those that refuse to accept that change is inevitable that will be harmed. They will be harmed by their own short sightedness, not by those of us who are telling them they are in great danger.
This whole Paris Agreement is a load of nonsense. China has only committed to trying to peak their carbon emissions by 2030 and having 20% of their total energy production to be non fossil fuels. It's not like anything is going to happen to China if they don't meet those goals. China has already been busted fudging their numbers on coal emissions. The reality is the Paris Agreement is basically useless. All these pledges by countries like China and India are insufficient. Numerous studies show that even if all these goals every country pledged for were met, it still won't be enough to keep the target of global warming below 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit.
"Together, we know that driving progress on addressing climate change is what's best for the economic health, jobs, and competitiveness of our companies and our country."
Or, to put it another way, "We've figured out a way to make money out of adopting this proposed change, so we're all for it!"
Exactly. Despite all the doomsayers we hear out of the Alberta oil patch, the White House, and from other people with a vested interest in polluting, it is possible to run a profitable business green. The green economy is the future. People can either join in it or keep making buggy whips and whining about how their jobs are disappearing.
Yes, it’s too bad for the hundreds of thousands of workers who will be put out of a job because Ottawa and Quebec would rather import their oil and gas from Russia.
The blind righteousness of the climate change crowd exemplifies “the road to hell is paved with good intentions.” When you intentionally put your own countrymen out of gainful employment in preference for an autocratic regime that will happily continue to export oil and gas for all its worth, it seems to be an Ethics 101 fail.
Does Canada even have an energy policy that is self sustaining?
Way to totally miss the point. Alberta could be a leader in solar, and wind, and geothermal, and biomass. But it won’t until it gets the idea out of its head that it is oil country only. The same goes for Texas, the same goes for most of the world. I WANT our fellow Canadians in Alberta to be prosperous, and I can see the handwriting is on the wall for oil. The trouble is that for political reasons the leaders there refuse to accept what is blindingly obvious to the rest of us.
A century ago Canada was a world leader in asbestos production. Even after it was clear that it killed people, Canada didn’t stop production to send to third world countries, where it was killing people. It was only a few years ago that they finally closed the last mine, and the town dependant on it has not yet recovered. I fear that Alberta is going to follow the same path. Keep producing what they know, be unwilling to change, and then be crushed when the market isn’t there any more. Alberta, has a chance to make a smooth transition. Over the next decade it could eliminate oil production from the tar sands and move onto other more profitable industries. The question is do they have the foresight to do it.
As an old pilot told me years ago, when you have an emergency you have a choice, go down in a controlled fashion, or fight to stay in the air as long as you can and then have an uncontrolled crash. That is the choice oil producing states, provinces, and countries have. It will be those that refuse to accept that change is inevitable that will be harmed. They will be harmed by their own short sightedness, not by those of us who are telling them they are in great danger.
I respectfully disagree. And I don’t think I missed the point since you brought Alberta into the discussion. If the “handwriting is on the wall for oil” as you say (and I don’t think it is for a moment unless nuclear is put back on the table) why does the rest of Canada continue to import from elsewhere? They may feel good (by putting all those oil workers out of work) but it will do nothing to mitigate climate change. Pointless, and kind of evil if you ask me.
But enough said on this topic, as this is a different discussion for a different forum.
All that said, I do fully support what Apple is doing. It’s good marketing, they’re doing it with their own money, and not trying to impose their will on others.
This whole Paris Agreement is a load of nonsense. China has only committed to trying to peak their carbon emissions by 2030 and having 20% of their total energy production to be non fossil fuels. It's not like anything is going to happen to China if they don't meet those goals. China has already been busted fudging their numbers on coal emissions. The reality is the Paris Agreement is basically useless. All these pledges by countries like China and India are insufficient. Numerous studies show that even if all these goals every country pledged for were met, it still won't be enough to keep the target of global warming below 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit.
Trump and his allies are not only on the do nothing trajectory, they are on the burn more, burn it faster one. The do nothing, business as usual course of action is >15 °F average increase and will mean the death of billions and most equatorial locations becoming uninhabitable. Fortunately, not all people behave this way.
Every reduction from the do nothing track means lives are saved. If the USA pulled out of the Paris Agreement because it is toothless and they wanted to do more, that would be great, but that is not what Trump is doing. Staying in or re-entering the Paris Agreement, though toothless, would symbolize the USA wants to do something. 5, 6, 8 °F are all better than 14, 16, 18 °F. As it stands, if Trump re-enters, it is meaningless as it is doubtful he will change anything his administration does, so this pleading by these CEOs are likely useless.
People have to vote. They have to vote at every election level and vote with their dollars.
Apple CEO Tim Cook, along with over 70 other chief executives, has signed a letter asking the U.S. to continue to adhere to the standards and goals set forth by the Paris Agreement.
Secretary John Kerry signs Paris Agreement on behalf of the US in 2016
The letter, which was written by Stuart Applebaum, the Executive Council & Chair of International Committee, AFL-CIO, addresses the seriousness of climate change globally. Specifically, the letter talks about the impacts of climbing global temperatures on the U.S. economy.
We the undersigned are a group of CEOs who employ more than 2 million people in the United States and union leaders who represent 12.5 million workers. Together, we know that driving progress on addressing climate change is what's best for the economic health, jobs, and competitiveness of our companies and our country.
In 2017, many of us came together to rally behind the US' participation in the Paris Agreement. We came together to say we are still in. Two years ago, the impacts of climbing global temperatures were clear. Today, with record temperatures across the country, fiercer hurricanes pummeling coasts, more destructive wildfires, droughts and flooding disrupting the economy, we have no time to waste.
It highlights the importance of upholding environmental standards while respecting workers' labor rights and companies' abilities to choose their own path to meet emission reduction goals.
The letter goes on to request that the U.S. make an effort to remain in the Paris Agreement, rather than attempt the withdrawal that President Trump had announced in 2017.
It was unsurprising to find that Tim Cook had signed the letter-- after all, Apple has begun to set itself apart in the realm of sustainability.
In the Spring of 2018, Apple had announced that their data centers, retail stores, and the Apple Park headquarters in Cupertino all ran on 100% renewable energy.
Apple has now set a goal to strive for a fully closed-loop supply chain, hoping to be able to produce products with 100% recycled materials. As 70% of Apple's greenhouse emissions come from the supply-chain, this would greatly reduce the detrimental impact of product production on the environment.
Other noteworthy CEOs who have signed the agreement include Tesla's Elon Musk, IBM's Ginni Rometty, and Microsoft's Satya Nadella.
The Paris Agreement is a voluntary agreement which seeks to restrict global temperature rise to less than 2C above pre-industrial levels, with a hopeful goal of less than 1.5C. Ratified in 2016, there are nearly 200 countries, territories, and states that have signed onto the agreement.
If left unchecked, the rising global temperature weathers will continue to cause an influx of more severe "super-storms," typhoons and hurricanes, tornadoes, and blizzards. The sea levels will rise as glaciers melt, displacing over 10% of the world's population by the year 2100. As the permafrost melts, methane stores in arctic regions could be released into the atmosphere, which would in turn accelerate global warming.
The primary goal is to limit carbon emissions, mostly through restructuring systems and incentivizing businesses to move to renewable energy. 186 countries within the Paris Agreement have submitted formal carbon reduction targets. The Paris Agreement also seeks to provide funding to developing countries -- up to $100 billion a year -- to mitigate losses from climate change, as well as provide clean, renewable energy frameworks.
While it's true that President Trump has declared the U.S. will withdraw from the Paris Agreement, the withdrawal cannot take place until after the presidential election in 2020. Since the announcement, and despite the US Navy declaring climate change one of the largest threats it faces, the U.S. has made several changes in policy that contradict the underlying terms of the Paris Agreement.
____________
Hey Tim Apple maybe you should be more concerned with the global over heating of your laptops and that your Monitor stands cost $1,000 USD before you go getting into something you know nothing about. Hmmm!???? BTW Trump won't take you seriously until you SJW bitch to Gore too, who has multiplr guzzling/polluting SUV's, Mansions and takes a personal jet when a commercial flight would do. When you treat evryone the same and not single Trump out he might listen to your China-kissing ass!
tht said: If there was only a nation that had a big enough economy to enact carbon tariffs on imports, which would compel some nations to change their behavior, and be able to convince other countries to do the same!
The Paris Agreement is voluntary. Toothless. It’s more symbolic than anything. There still needs to be a strong group of nations that can form an economic block and develop incentives for decarbonization. We are still quite far away from this. Nice to have nations agree to do things, but it will be better if we were unified with coordinate efforts.
If only all the progressive, mega-billion-dollar companies that import all those goods would conduct carbon audits of their suppliers instead of waiting for government to do every damned thing, then maybe something would get done. Why does there have to be a law to force even small companies to comply with a treaty they don't care about when the companies who say they care deeply are perfectly able to take care of this on their own?
The only reason Apple wants government to enact laws and restrictions to carbon output is because Apple can easily afford to comply with those rules. Smaller competitors cannot, and Apple knows that those smaller companies will fold before complying. This is how businesses are run in this country when you have lobbyists who persuade government officials to enact laws that adversely affect all competition. If Tim Cook truly wants to do the right thing, he already has the power to do that thing. And he has the power to force dozens if not hundreds of companies around the world to do that thing, too. Asking the government to do it is, at best, lip service and at worst, anti-competitive.
Personally, I think electric cars are awesome. But I cannot even come close to being able to afford one. So I drive a 20-year-old Jeep that averages about 11MPG. 16MPG on a really good highway drive. I'm doing my part to burn up all the oil on this planet so we can move on to the next power source, because expecting people to stop using oil when there is oil available is a fool's errand.
Great business move by Apple. This will force all other US corporations to adopt the “green values” for their US chemical processing and manufacturing that Apple has chosen to enact with little to no U.S. chemical processing and manufacturing in the U.S. Tim should next lobby for CA HHS or Apple HR take over US HHS and FDA. Annnnnnnd go!
tht said: If there was only a nation that had a big enough economy to enact carbon tariffs on imports, which would compel some nations to change their behavior, and be able to convince other countries to do the same!
The Paris Agreement is voluntary. Toothless. It’s more symbolic than anything. There still needs to be a strong group of nations that can form an economic block and develop incentives for decarbonization. We are still quite far away from this. Nice to have nations agree to do things, but it will be better if we were unified with coordinate efforts.
If only all the progressive, mega-billion-dollar companies that import all those goods would conduct carbon audits of their suppliers instead of waiting for government to do every damned thing, then maybe something would get done. Why does there have to be a law to force even small companies to comply with a treaty they don't care about when the companies who say they care deeply are perfectly able to take care of this on their own?
From the article for this very AI thread: In the Spring of 2018, Apple had announced that their data centers, retail stores, and the Apple Park headquarters in Cupertino all ran on 100% renewable energy.
Apple has now set a goal to strive for a fully closed-loop supply chain, hoping to be able to produce products with 100% recycled materials. As 70% of Apple's greenhouse emissions come from the supply-chain, this would greatly reduce the detrimental impact of product production on the environment.
Apple is headed towards a 100% renewable energy, fully closed loop supply chain. Their facilities are 100% renewable worldwide as of 2019, and about a quarter of their suppliers have agreed to go that way. They are continuing to drive their whole supply chain to use renewable energy and they have a goal of using renewable or recyclable materials for their products. Their product packaging is mostly paper and they own and partner with forests to maintain a neutral paper production cycle. They are using recycled aluminum, recycled plastic and recycled rare Earth metals for certain components now. Only small steps now with a fully closed manufacturing cycle, but it’s their goal to be fully closed loop. They put their money where their mouth is.
The Paris Agreement is voluntary. It is not law and is therefore toothless. It’s symbolism, not action, which is why hardly anyone is meeting their targets. There should be laws or economic incentives to speed up the mass production cycle of renewables and carbon free/negative production processes. It isn’t about small or big players. It’s about getting the economy to use a different means of energy production. A technology transition. As with any transition, incumbents often fail to transition (Nokia, BlackBerry), but what replaces it is a bigger set of players with a flotilla of different smaller players.
For the oft used “what about China or India” point about them not decarbonizing, as I said, put carbon tariffs on their products. If you have a strong enough group of nations, sanctions. It’s not a stand-off of “if they don’t do it, we shouldn’t”. There are certainly more productive mechanisms to getting them to transition faster, rather than a point supporting the do nothing option.
A recent report shows that the Paris agreement levels are inadequate and no major economy is currently on track to meet the standards agreed upon. At this point the agreement is more symbolic and aspirational than something likely to happen.
The time to act would have been back when a certain Apple Board member made a film about the problem...
Thank goodness we were smart enough to not fall for his science fiction film. Sure there was some hysteria when it was first released but most have forgotten all about it. Event Gore himself couldn’t be bothered by it to change his own ways.
Climate change is not about putting the AC up a notch, putting on another sweater, it's about major disruption of a system we all depend upon. Apple products depend on specific metals which are not home grown but come from regions of the world which might suffer the worst in regards to flooding, famine, drought, civic unrest and political corruption. The price to make an iPhone etc... will skyrocket when a fragile resource chain is broken. Science deniers which most of those commenting here seem to be are not thinking beyond their own front door. It's a big complicated world out there and we are all dependent on each other regardless if you understand that or not.
China and the western Pacific rim are by far the biggest polluters in the world and I don't expect China to concede much in the accords. Putting heavy restrictions on the US economy without the biggest polluters doing their fair share of CO2 reduction is a good reason for the US to pull out.
China is a big polluter because big American companies have their products made there. American companies went for cheap labor, little to no environmental laws or regulations to deal with to keep profits high and prices low. China's pollution today is what America experienced in the first half of the 20th century. Blaming China is blaming ourselves.
Don’t worry about this. You can exhaust all the CO2 you want from your own body as it is carbon neutral to the atmosphere.
The issue at hand is that our means of producing energy is generated by extracting carbon based fuels from the ground and releasing the gaseous exhaust (CO2, NO, etc) into the atmosphere. We’ve already nearly doubled the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere doing this. The consequence of this has been said ad infinitum. The solution is to change the means by which we produce energy. Net-net is will be a huge benefit to us all if transition as fast as possible.
Tim, do your bloody job as Apple CEO or leave already. Stop confusing your position with that of a busybody enviro-authoritarian for the Left.
He is doing his job. He is reducing how much it costs to run Apple by switching to renewable energy, by trying to go closed loop manufacturing.
If people have a house or property, it’s a no brainer to go solar today (except for issues with insolation hours, like trees or roof issues). ROI is getting down to 8 years in some places, and represents savings of tens of thousands of dollars over 20 to 30 years. Apple has a whole lot of property and energy use. It will be on order billions of dollars in energy costs saved. The recycling and recovery+processing is the same. Once the processes have matured, it will be cheaper to use recycled material than to be new from wherever.
Longer term, reducing the effect of global warming is ensuring the size of the market Apple can sell into. The do nothing option is billions dead, countries and borders being redrawn, unstable economies. Ie, a contraction in the market.
Tim, do your bloody job as Apple CEO or leave already. Stop confusing your position with that of a busybody enviro-authoritarian for the Left.
Longer term, reducing the effect of global warming is ensuring the size of the market Apple can sell into. The do nothing option is billions dead, countries and borders being redrawn, unstable economies. Ie, a contraction in the market.
If global warming were a real event, then the climate data wouldn't need to be faked to fit the narrative.
Here's a good recap discussing the "Climategate" scandal from 2009
Here’s the link from Wikipedia on Climategate stating that the controversy was likely manufactured by quote mining creating a false impression. Multiple investigations over it have exonerated the emailers.
“Eight committees investigated the allegations and published reports, finding no evidence of fraud or scientific misconduct.”
It was just your usual quote mining where selective quotes were taking out of context out of the history of email correspondence primarily between 4 people.
In the end, the field of study is about a century old with thousands of people continually studying, criticizing, replicating and expanding the knowledge base. If they are doing something technically wrong, they would certainly like the input.
We really need Apple News, CNN, MSNBC, the F’n UN and Tim to deny that oceans have been rising for 20,000 years. The unfortunate record even shows rising in the U.S. pre-Lincoln. Please purge such things so we can continue the movement.
Hey, we drill ice cores for CO2 levels to see what ice didn’t exist a million years ago. Math much?
Tim, do your bloody job as Apple CEO or leave already. Stop confusing your position with that of a busybody enviro-authoritarian for the Left.
Longer term, reducing the effect of global warming is ensuring the size of the market Apple can sell into. The do nothing option is billions dead, countries and borders being redrawn, unstable economies. Ie, a contraction in the market.
If global warming were a real event, then the climate data wouldn't need to be faked to fit the narrative.
Here's a good recap discussing the "Climategate" scandal from 2009
Here’s the link from Wikipedia on Climategate stating that the controversy was likely manufactured by quote mining creating a false impression. Multiple investigations over it have exonerated the emailers.
“Eight committees investigated the allegations and published reports, finding no evidence of fraud or scientific misconduct.”
It was just your usual quote mining where selective quotes were taking out of context out of the history of email correspondence primarily between 4 people.
In the end, the field of study is about a century old with thousands of people continually studying, criticizing, replicating and expanding the knowledge base. If they are doing something technically wrong, they would certainly like the input.
Thank you for attempting to explain what happened during Climategate, but if you were to read some of those emails, you would see how damning they are. So to brush it all off as mere quote mining is quite a stretch.
Moreover there actually are a surprising number of scientists who refute the global warming narrative and who state, that if anything, the earth is about to enter a cooling period, not a warming one.
But far from their input being welcomed as you suggest, they are instead pilloried and ostracized.
The reason for this is because modern day climate science is not a science in the traditional sense, but rather a political movement where dissent is quickly dealt with.
Climate science, as it stands today, is merely an attempt to justify a huge wealth confiscation tax in the form of so-called carbon taxes. And the scarier you make the narrative, the easier it will be to collect those taxes, or so the thinking goes.
There is nothing to see in Climategate as the Wikipedia article attests. 8 different investigation went over the same email correspondence of 4 people, saw a bit of sausage making and found nothing. It’s a field involving thousands of people. They check, replicate, and criticize each other just like any other field.
Those who say it will cool or won’t get hotter can simply prove their models by demonstrating it can replicate the gross trends of the past 150 years of temperature data. Then, they can make their prediction for when it will start cooling, or stay the same. If they are right, time will prove it.
There has been no long term cooling trend observed for the past 50 years. It’s a half century of a gross trend of continuously increasing global averaged surface temperatures, and the dominant physics models are all matching this demonstrating they have the dominant physics properly modeled. It better start cooling soon as there are already signs of aggregate heat stress among equatorial peoples, and probably some at mid and polar latitudes too. Another +2 °F from the global average temperature today will be bad, so it would be nice if it started cooling. But the physics is immutable. It’s just a heat transfer process. The models aren’t wrong and we have to change our means of energy production.
The carbon tax is a cultural incentive to change our energy production so that we have a more viable future. In this changed future, there will continue to be ultra wealthy people, multi-trillion dollar conglomerates, so on and so forth. The only thing different is fossil fuel incumbents of today likely won’t transition, like Nokia or Blackberry didn’t in handhelds, and they will make way for new multi-billion dollar companies and individuals who will have low tax rates just like today. Lost opportunity as many of them have the knowledge to convert CO2 back to liquid and solid forms. Companies will be paid billions to trillions to do this in the coming decades, yet they refuse and choose a future where they will die anyway.
Comments
Yes, it’s too bad for the hundreds of thousands of workers who will be put out of a job because Ottawa and Quebec would rather import their oil and gas from Russia.
The blind righteousness of the climate change crowd exemplifies “the road to hell is paved with good intentions.” When you intentionally put your own countrymen out of gainful employment in preference for an autocratic regime that will happily continue to export oil and gas for all its worth, it seems to be an Ethics 101 fail.
Does Canada even have an energy policy that is self sustaining?
Alberta could be a leader in solar, and wind, and geothermal, and biomass. But it won’t until it gets the idea out of its head that it is oil country only. The same goes for Texas, the same goes for most of the world. I WANT our fellow Canadians in Alberta to be prosperous, and I can see the handwriting is on the wall for oil. The trouble is that for political reasons the leaders there refuse to accept what is blindingly obvious to the rest of us.
I respectfully disagree. And I don’t think I missed the point since you brought Alberta into the discussion. If the “handwriting is on the wall for oil” as you say (and I don’t think it is for a moment unless nuclear is put back on the table) why does the rest of Canada continue to import from elsewhere? They may feel good (by putting all those oil workers out of work) but it will do nothing to mitigate climate change. Pointless, and kind of evil if you ask me.
But enough said on this topic, as this is a different discussion for a different forum.
All that said, I do fully support what Apple is doing. It’s good marketing, they’re doing it with their own money, and not trying to impose their will on others.
Every reduction from the do nothing track means lives are saved. If the USA pulled out of the Paris Agreement because it is toothless and they wanted to do more, that would be great, but that is not what Trump is doing. Staying in or re-entering the Paris Agreement, though toothless, would symbolize the USA wants to do something. 5, 6, 8 °F are all better than 14, 16, 18 °F. As it stands, if Trump re-enters, it is meaningless as it is doubtful he will change anything his administration does, so this pleading by these CEOs are likely useless.
People have to vote. They have to vote at every election level and vote with their dollars.
The only reason Apple wants government to enact laws and restrictions to carbon output is because Apple can easily afford to comply with those rules. Smaller competitors cannot, and Apple knows that those smaller companies will fold before complying. This is how businesses are run in this country when you have lobbyists who persuade government officials to enact laws that adversely affect all competition. If Tim Cook truly wants to do the right thing, he already has the power to do that thing. And he has the power to force dozens if not hundreds of companies around the world to do that thing, too. Asking the government to do it is, at best, lip service and at worst, anti-competitive.
In the Spring of 2018, Apple had announced that their data centers, retail stores, and the Apple Park headquarters in Cupertino all ran on 100% renewable energy.
Apple has now set a goal to strive for a fully closed-loop supply chain, hoping to be able to produce products with 100% recycled materials. As 70% of Apple's greenhouse emissions come from the supply-chain, this would greatly reduce the detrimental impact of product production on the environment.
Apple is headed towards a 100% renewable energy, fully closed loop supply chain. Their facilities are 100% renewable worldwide as of 2019, and about a quarter of their suppliers have agreed to go that way. They are continuing to drive their whole supply chain to use renewable energy and they have a goal of using renewable or recyclable materials for their products. Their product packaging is mostly paper and they own and partner with forests to maintain a neutral paper production cycle. They are using recycled aluminum, recycled plastic and recycled rare Earth metals for certain components now. Only small steps now with a fully closed manufacturing cycle, but it’s their goal to be fully closed loop. They put their money where their mouth is.
The Paris Agreement is voluntary. It is not law and is therefore toothless. It’s symbolism, not action, which is why hardly anyone is meeting their targets. There should be laws or economic incentives to speed up the mass production cycle of renewables and carbon free/negative production processes. It isn’t about small or big players. It’s about getting the economy to use a different means of energy production. A technology transition. As with any transition, incumbents often fail to transition (Nokia, BlackBerry), but what replaces it is a bigger set of players with a flotilla of different smaller players.
China is a big polluter because big American companies have their products made there. American companies went for cheap labor, little to no environmental laws or regulations to deal with to keep profits high and prices low. China's pollution today is what America experienced in the first half of the 20th century. Blaming China is blaming ourselves.
The issue at hand is that our means of producing energy is generated by extracting carbon based fuels from the ground and releasing the gaseous exhaust (CO2, NO, etc) into the atmosphere. We’ve already nearly doubled the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere doing this. The consequence of this has been said ad infinitum. The solution is to change the means by which we produce energy. Net-net is will be a huge benefit to us all if transition as fast as possible.
He is doing his job. He is reducing how much it costs to run Apple by switching to renewable energy, by trying to go closed loop manufacturing.
If people have a house or property, it’s a no brainer to go solar today (except for issues with insolation hours, like trees or roof issues). ROI is getting down to 8 years in some places, and represents savings of tens of thousands of dollars over 20 to 30 years. Apple has a whole lot of property and energy use. It will be on order billions of dollars in energy costs saved. The recycling and recovery+processing is the same. Once the processes have matured, it will be cheaper to use recycled material than to be new from wherever.
Longer term, reducing the effect of global warming is ensuring the size of the market Apple can sell into. The do nothing option is billions dead, countries and borders being redrawn, unstable economies. Ie, a contraction in the market.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climatic_Research_Unit_email_controversy
“Eight committees investigated the allegations and published reports, finding no evidence of fraud or scientific misconduct.”
In the end, the field of study is about a century old with thousands of people continually studying, criticizing, replicating and expanding the knowledge base. If they are doing something technically wrong, they would certainly like the input.
Hey, we drill ice cores for CO2 levels to see what ice didn’t exist a million years ago. Math much?
Those who say it will cool or won’t get hotter can simply prove their models by demonstrating it can replicate the gross trends of the past 150 years of temperature data. Then, they can make their prediction for when it will start cooling, or stay the same. If they are right, time will prove it.
The carbon tax is a cultural incentive to change our energy production so that we have a more viable future. In this changed future, there will continue to be ultra wealthy people, multi-trillion dollar conglomerates, so on and so forth. The only thing different is fossil fuel incumbents of today likely won’t transition, like Nokia or Blackberry didn’t in handhelds, and they will make way for new multi-billion dollar companies and individuals who will have low tax rates just like today. Lost opportunity as many of them have the knowledge to convert CO2 back to liquid and solid forms. Companies will be paid billions to trillions to do this in the coming decades, yet they refuse and choose a future where they will die anyway.