T. Rex: Engineering Fantasies
Global warming? “It’s an engineering problem, and it has engineering solutions.”
According to Rex Tillerson, Donald Trump’s choice for Secretary of State, adapting to climate change is an engineering problem that has an engineering solution. A soundbite from a Council on Foreign Relations presentation by Tillerson has been widely reported. But it is worthwhile to consider his full answer and its context.
Here are the question and answer:
QUESTIONER: Hi, I’m David Fenton.
Mr. Tillerson, I want to talk about science and risk, and I agree with you that’s the way we must proceed. So, as you know, it’s a basic fact of physics that CO2 traps heat, and too much CO2 will mean it will get too hot, and we will face enormous risks as a result of this not only to our way of life, but to the world economy. It will be devastating: The seas will rise, the coastlines will be unstable for generations, the price of food will go crazy. This is what we face, and we all know it.
Now — so my question for you is since we all know this knowledge, we’re a little in denial of it. You know, if we burn all these reserves you’ve talked about, you can kiss future generations good-bye. And maybe we’ll find a solution to take it out of the air. But, as you know, we don’t have one. So what are you going to do about this? We need your help to do something about this.
TILLERSON: Well, let me — let me say that we have studied that issue and continue to study it as well. We are and have been long-time participants in the IPCC panels. We author many of the IPCC subcommittee papers, and we peer-review most of them. So we are very current on the science, our understanding of the science, and importantly — and this is where I’m going to take exception to something you said — the competency of the models to predict the future. We’ve been working with a very good team at MIT now for more than 20 years on this area of modeling the climate, which, since obviously it’s an area of great interest to you, you know and have to know the competencies of the models are not particularly good.
Now you can plug in assumptions on many elements of the climate system that we cannot model — and you know what they all are. We cannot model aerosols; we cannot model clouds, which are big, big factors in how the CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere affect temperatures at surface level. The models we need — and we are putting a lot of money supporting people and continuing to work on these models, try and become more competent with the models. But our ability to predict, with any accuracy, what the future’s going to be is really pretty limited.
So our approach is we do look at the range of the outcomes and try and understand the consequences of that, and clearly there’s going to be an impact. So I’m not disputing that increasing CO2 emissions in the atmosphere is going to have an impact. It’ll have a warming impact. The — how large it is is what is very hard for anyone to predict. And depending on how large it is, then projects how dire the consequences are.
As we have looked at the most recent studies coming — and the IPCC reports, which we — I’ve seen the drafts; I can’t say too much because they’re not out yet. But when you predict things like sea level rise, you get numbers all over the map. If you take a — what I would call a reasonable scientific approach to that, we believe those consequences are manageable. They do require us to begin to exert — or spend more policy effort on adaptation. What do you want to do if we think the future has sea level rising four inches, six inches? Where are the impacted areas, and what do you want to do to adapt to that?
And as human beings as a — as a — as a species, that’s why we’re all still here. We have spent our entire existence adapting, OK? So we will adapt to this. Changes to weather patterns that move crop production areas around — we’ll adapt to that. It’s an engineering problem, and it has engineering solutions. And so I don’t — the fear factor that people want to throw out there to say we just have to stop this, I do not accept.
I do believe we have to — we have to be efficient and we have to manage it, but we also need to look at the other side of the engineering solution, which is how are we going to adapt to it. And there are solutions. It’s not a problem that we can’t solve.
ALAN MURRAY: But let’s stick with that for just a second. I mean, Exxon Mobil, before you became CEO, was very aggressive and overt in challenging and mounting a public relations campaign against the sorts of things that Mr. Fenton just managed. You changed that when you came in. But I guess the question I’d ask — I was at my daughter’s graduation last weekend, and the graduation speaker said that global warming is the great challenge of your generation. Do you agree with that? Would you agree that it’s in — at least one of the top five challenges of the generation, or do you personally think that it’s been way overblown?
TILLERSON: No, I think it’s — I think it’s a great challenge, but I think it’s a question back to priorities. And I think, as I just described based on our understanding of the system and the models and the science and that there are engineering solutions to adapting, that we think it’s solvable.
And I think there are much more pressing priorities that we as a — as a human being race and society need to deal with. There are still hundreds of millions, billions of people living in abject poverty around the world. They need electricity. They need electricity they can count on, that they can afford. They need fuel to cook their food on that’s not animal dung. There are more people’s health being dramatically affected because they could — they don’t even have access to fossil fuels to burn. They’d love to burn fossil fuels because their quality of life would rise immeasurably, and their quality of health and the health of their children and their future would rise immeasurably. You’d save millions upon millions of lives by making fossil fuels more available to a lot of the part of the world that doesn’t have it, and do it in the most efficient ways, using the most efficient technologies we have today.
And we continue, and have for many, many years, talked on our energy outlook about the importance of ongoing energy efficiency, continuing to carry out economic activity with a lower energy intensity. And we’ve been very good as a country at doing that. We’ve been very good globally at doing that. And there’s more potential in it.
“My philosophy is to make money. If I can drill and make money, then that’s what I want to do.” — Rex Tillerson, to Charlie Rose, March 2013. To be sure, Tillerson’s answer was in response to the question, “is your philosophy ‘Drill, baby, drill!’?”
Andreas Malm cited Tillerson’s comments, both on drilling to make money and on engineering being the solution to climate change in the context of a discussion of geo-engineering in the penultimate chapter of Fossil Capital: The Rise of Steam Power and the Roots of Global Warming. There he highlighted the incongruity that advocates of geo-engineering are typically antagonistic to the idea of a planned economy, yet the geo-engineering they promote would require centralized planning and international coordination of unprecedented, prodigious scale and complexity:
Planning the economy is the ultimate taboo; planning the climate is worthy of close consideration, an idea cognate with genetic engineering, GPS systems, smart devices, in vitro meat, drone warfare and other natural elements of late capitalist hypermodernity. Fossil capital would die in a transition; geoengineering may give it a new lease on life; what began as real subsumption of labour must end as real subsumption of the biosphere. There is that nagging feeling that a fleet of airplanes packed with sulphur are far more likely to show up than a special Ministry for a Transition to a Low-Carbon Future. It has become easier to imagine deliberate, large-scale intervention in the climate system than in capitalism.
When Tillerson spoke about an engineering solution to climate change, he talked about managing the consequences, adapting to higher sea levels and relocating agriculture. He didn’t specify trying to reverse global warming through blocking incoming solar radiation. But building dikes against rising sea levels and massively relocating agriculture are also forms of geo-engineering when undertaken on such a large scale. No less than schemes to block solar radiation, adaptation projects would require planning and coordination.
But engineering solutions also require something that Tillerson has little confidence in: the competency of models to accurately predict the severity and consequences of climate change. Tillerson’s insistence that there will be engineering solutions to engineering problems proceeds immediately after his dismissal of numbers that are “all over the map” — numbers that would be crucial to the success of engineering solutions!
What exactly is going on here?
Robert Fletcher and Crelis Rammelt refer to “Lacanian fantasy” in “Decoupling: A Key Fantasy of the Post-2015 Sustainable Development Agenda.” Such a fantasy enables, simultaneously, both the promise of a future solution and an alibi for not achieving that solution in the form of a “disavowal,” which proclaims, in effect, “I know very well, but still…” The concept of decoupling GDP growth from carbon emissions and, by implication, from fossil fuel consumption, is the obvious complement to Tillerson’s engineering solution, in that the fantasy of decoupling envisions mitigation of climate change, while Tillerson’s fantasy envisions adaptation to the changing climate.
In its 2011 report on decoupling, the United Nations Environmental Program was more comprehensive in its disavowal of its solution than was Tillerson in his curt dismissal of the competence of climate models. Fletcher and Rammelt summarized that disavowal in the following excerpt:
Anatomy of a Disavowal
While asserting the necessity of dramatic decoupling for any hope of genuine sustainable development, in short, UNEP simultaneously admits that: (1) there is virtually no evidence that (absolute) decoupling works; (2) the conceptual basis for even imagining its possibility is weak; and (3) even if it were possible, it would be politically infeasible. A clearer case of disavowal would be difficult to identify.
This disavowal is necessary because there are in fact fundamental tensions within a neoliberal capitalist economy, between the concerns for poverty alleviation, environmental protection, and profit generation that the decoupling proposal asserts are reconcilable. Biophysical growth—no matter how ‘dematerialized’—remains finite, and thus far, growth of the global financial system has, as evidenced below, continued to increase natural resource extraction in absolute terms. A reversal of that trend is nowhere in sight. At the same time, economic growth in and of itself will do nothing for poverty alleviation without strong redistribution policies that are contrary to strict market logic. Considered together, these problems raise serious questions concerning the viability of a SDG agenda rooted in the idea of decoupling.
Actually, he completely ignores three crucial points:
1. We NEVER act “as a species”. But if agriculturally productive areas are moving around the globe, we have to move very large numbers of people. And he is part of an anti-migrant government.
2. He never mentions the elephant in the room, population growth.
3. Geo-engineering doesn’t solve the underlying problem. At best it buys you time to solve the underlying problem. And we will have to do it anyway. It is not a solution.
Oh, and then there is ocean acidification.
Question 1 shows the problem with the overall misunderstanding of the physics of AGW/CC/Climate wierding/etc. “So, as you know, it’s a basic fact of physics that CO2 TRAPS HEAT, and too much CO2 will mean it will get too hot, and we will face enormous risks as a result of this not only to our way of life, but to the world economy. ” NO! CO2 does not TRAP heat, but it does SLOW for a fraction (micro/milli) of a second the loss of heat energy before releasing that energy. Energy release is in a random direction with the bulk lost forever going out to space.
The specific heat energy is carried via vibrating photons at frequencies specific to the temperatures at their original release. When those photon frequencies match those of CO2 molecules the CO2 molecules can attract a photon, and temporarily transfer that vibrational energy to the CO2 molecule before the molecule. releases it in the form of another vibrating photon.
All this happens at the speed of light and it is critical to note the vibrational frequencies relationship to specific temperatures. As the temperatures change so do the photon vibrational frequencies. Photons vibrating outside the range of CO2 notch frequencies will not be attracted nor energy transferred.
Cooling/heat loss occurs via convection, conduction and radiation (photons). The AGW hypothesis is based upon the specific radiation principles cited above.
There is so much else going on in the atmosphere related to convection and conduction, that these processes related to the relatively small slot temperatures/frequencies of CO2 are swamped.
And, we haven’t even considered the changes possible in the gains of this heat energy
I think this will be a more often seen result of the election as time passes: “DNR purges climate change from web page” http://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/2016/12/28/dnr-purges-climate-change-on-web-page/95929564/
The article makes this point:
“In the latest changes, the DNR says of climate change, “as it has done throughout the centuries, the earth is going through a change. The reasons for this change at this particular time in the earth’s long history are being debated and researched by academic entities outside the Department of Natural Resources.”
Officials replaced this wording:
“Earth’s climate is changing. Human activities that increase heat-trapping (‘greenhouse’) gases are the main cause.”
The old text goes on to say “scientists agree” that the Great Lakes region will see longer summers and shorter winters, decreased ice cover and changes in rain and snow patterns “if climate change patterns continue.””
SW,
You had to know this would happen.
CoRev citations for that please. We know it is not your work product and your past posting history has made any idea that your name carries any credibility in and of itself is, in the immortal words of Ron Ziegler “inoperative”
You have spent years on this site putting forth every single bit of the climate denier apparatus as being unquestionable true while denying any and all evidence to the contrary. Sometimes this is dressed up in impressive clothes as here and sometimes it is just “Michael Mann Hockey Stick Nyah Nyah Nyah”. But in any event your independent cred on this issue among long time readers, and more importantly long time contributers is zero.
Feel free to cite reports but dont’ try to pose as some sort of climate physicist when you are just aping stuff you may or may not understand.
As for your second comment you don’t bother to tell us WHICH DNR (typially a State agency) is doing this. But all you are really reporting is that known climate denying Governors like Walker of Wisconsin are doing some new climate denying. This is news how? And why?
The Wisconsin DNR does not do climate research. Your link provides no climate data. You are trolling, as usual, CoRev.
For those who care to learn about the evidence that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming, here’s a link in fairly lay language:
https://www.skepticalscience.com/empirical-evidence-for-co2-enhanced-greenhouse-effect.htm
Bruce, I realize this isn’t a Social Security thread, so I am not surprised that you did not recognize the core hypothesis of the AGW theory. Accordingly, I do not intend to provide a cite for something this basic. Not recognizing it is enough evidence to negate your own understanding of the validity of any and all evidence to the contrary.”
My comment was in no way an in depth treatise on the AGW hypothesis, and especially in no way adequate for describing the Green House Effect for which AGW is just one portion.
It is a common misunderstanding: ” So, as you know, it’s a BASIC FACT of physics that CO2 traps heat,…” that trapping is for a significant time frame. It is from this fundamental misunderstanding of the physics that many of the misconceptions (just read the rest of his Question 1 following my quote.)
Since you have followed my comments for years, you should recognize the familiarity of Tillerson said: “So I’m not disputing that increasing CO2 emissions in the atmosphere is going to have an impact. It’ll have a warming impact. The — how large it is is what is very hard for anyone to predict. And depending on how large it is, then projects how dire the consequences are.” I have said essentially the same thing for those many years, and it has usually been accompanied with the math to support estimates of temperature change claims. Oh, and don’t forget my request for others to also do the math.
As to How and Why, it is the start of the impacts of the election and the acceptance of the alternate science that has been readily available for those many years. More examples of these kinds of changes will occur in official documents.
Horseshit. Any comment that presents the following as some sort of simple component of AGW hypothesis that does not need some sort of citation is an implicit claim on authority.
“The specific heat energy is carried via vibrating photons at frequencies specific to the temperatures at their original release. When those photon frequencies match those of CO2 molecules the CO2 molecules can attract a photon, and temporarily transfer that vibrational energy to the CO2 molecule before the molecule. releases it in the form of another vibrating photon.”
You have a history of parroting “facts” on topics from Iraq to Climate Change that have demonstated that you are at BEST a self-animating sock puppet, back in the day for Don Senor when he was the chief propagandist for the Coalition Authority and in recent years for persons unknown on Climate Change. Or perhaps better a sock monkey, because you ape authority that is never actually demonstrated.
Are you really telling us that you just sourced the above quote right out of your head, just a byproduct of your training? I mean you just lay it out so matter of fact-like as if the AB readership should naturally accept your authority on this topic. Well I don’t. And I am not alone on that front.
You’re missing CoRev’s point, Joel. Which is that Scott Walker, Ph.D. in geophysics, does do climate research, which he passes along to Wisconsin’s DNR.
Joel, my response was a direct link to the article with a quote. That is not trolling. Your “trolling” claim actually is trolling.
Your SkS reference says this: “…Many scientist have refined the theory in the last century. Nearly all have reached the same conclusion: if we increase the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the Earth will warm up.
What they don’t agree on is by how much. This issue is called ‘climate sensitivity’,…” Even it confirms Tillerson’s understanding.
Bruce: I can not help what you believe: “Are you really telling us that you just sourced the above quote right out of your head, just a byproduct of your training? I mean you just lay it out so matter of fact-like as if the AB readership should naturally accept your authority on this topic. ” If you want to confirm my understanding of this small part of the physics read the comments from Joel’s SkS reference.
BTW, you might note that they reference an even shorter period of CO2 energy residence, nano-to micro seconds, to my more conservative micro to milliseconds. If its not clear that “trapping” of energy at these time frames is inconsequential to warming. “Trapping” actually occurs art the surface and primarily in the oceans where the time frames are significant from days and even centuries. Most of this trapped heat is from short wave light and not the long wave IR.
Your post says this:
“There is so much else going on in the atmosphere related to convection and conduction, that these processes related to the relatively small slot temperatures/frequencies of CO2 are swamped.”
My SkS reference says that nearly all climate scientists have reached the same conclusion: if we increase the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the Earth will warm up.”
You assert that the effects of CO2 are swamped. My link notes that nearly all climate scientists have reached the conclusion. None of them have reached your laughable and unsupported conclusion that the effects of CO2 on global warming are “inconsequential.”
The reference I posted does not support your conclusion. I certainly encourage any AB reader who doesn’t already ignore your trolling to read the link.
More on the science of carbon dioxide’s role in causing global warming here:
http://history.aip.org/climate/co2.htm
Joel, even the comments in your reference raise serious questions of the amount of impact of ATMOSPHERIC CO2 on temperatures.
Do you refute my understanding of the fundamental physics as related to the “TRAPPING” claim? Otherwise you are just continuing to troll.
CoRev:
You are the last person on this blog to be calling someone else a troll or to claim they are trolling.
Run, to troll: “In Internet slang, a troll (/ˈtroʊl/, /ˈtrɒl/) is a person who sows discord on the Internet by starting arguments or upsetting people, by posting inflammatory,[1] extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community (such as a newsgroup, forum, chat room, or blog) with the intent of provoking readers into an emotional response[2] or of otherwise disrupting normal, on-topic discussion,[3] often for the troll’s amusement.”
My comment was none of those things, nor were my replies. If some readers were upset by my explanation of the basic physics, and why the oft repeated claim of “trapped” is a questionable concept, it is not a reflection of my comment, but their belief in a near myth. Repetition does not add truth to an exaggeration.
With all due respect, CoRev, you are indeed trolling, by your own definition. Your objection to the use of the word “trapped” is extraneous to the issue of whether climate change is real or what its severity or consequences are likely to be. Fenton was not presenting a scientific paper but was asking a question in a public forum. Did you not notice that Rex Tillerson didn’t object to the word “trapped”? Obviously, then, BY YOUR STANDARDS Tillerson is illiterate on the issue of climate change and we should pay no attention to anything he says. After all, he was the expert. Fenton was just asking a question.
CoRev:
Sandwichman is being nice to you; although, I have seen him tell commenters their comments were not welcome. I have a much shorter fuse as I have been here for years and have watched you, Sammy, and MG go back and forth with Bruce, Coberly and others as well. I am not prone to give you much slack as you are trolling. To accuse Joel of trolling is laughable.
I did not listen to the verbal and maybe I should of the 1 hour plus some verbal. This caught my eye:
I would read this over and over as Tillerson is saying; “I do Not Know.” When I walk into a factory which I am asked to help make competitive, I see something concrete I can work with there. I can ascertain the flow of production, the capacity bottlenecks, the material movement, what each person does there, the Overhead Costs I can not change there, the Labor Costs I can change, and the market competition. Tillerson is saying I have to see the factory floor before I can ascertain what needs to be done. He does not know because the model parameters are constantly changing. He knows he can not decide now until he sees what exists at that moment in time and then it will change.
I would accept Sandwichman’s comment back at you and just retire as he has it right. Have a good evening . . .
May I interrupt CoRev’s OFF-TOPIC diversion to point out that my post dd not quarrel with Tillerson’s assessment of the severity of climate change. That is not to say I agree with it. But EVEN IF Tillerson is right about the lack of competence of climate models and EVEN IF he is right about consequences not being too dire, his smugness about an engineering solution is undermined by his EXPLICIT DISAVOWAL of his own solution. You can’t use an unspecified “engineering” to solve a problem whose dimensions are radically unknown, described by “numbers all over the map.”
That “numbers all over the map” is Tillerson’s contention. The results you get from models depend on the assumptions you make. Tillerson — whose philosophy is make money — makes assumptions that are consistent with his philosophy. Big surprise.
Bigger surprise: I can’t prove Tillerson’s assumptions about the severity and impacts of climate change are wrong. But I do know that uncertainty is not our friend here.
Tillerson is using uncertainty as a mask to conceal a void. There is nothing behind that mask. He does not have a solution. His “solution” is to disavow the “numbers all over the map.”
In his own perception of the problem, “engineering” functions as a FANTASY. It is a way of making excuses in advance for the inevitable failure of his “solution.” The word “engineering” does not refer to the applied mechanical and chemical processes that is its presumed object. It is simply an empty place holder to stitch together the idea of “numbers all over the map” and the imperative of “a solution.”
Got to wonder about the engineering wisdom of ignoring worst case scenarios. Ask folks from New Orleans about that.
Jack:
I am not sure a worst case scenario can be determined
Tillerson seems to think that’s what we’re all talking about and he doesn’t want to deal with it because it’s not for sure it’s gonna happen. He implies that an engineering solution (dikes? stilts?) could be employed but not to worry because we aren’t there yet. Of course when we get there it’ll be too late.
The worst case scenario is not ExxonMobil’s or Tillerson’s problem. THAT is the “engineering” solution to the worst case scenario.
To claim that since we don’t know precisely the progression of anthropogenic global warming and therefore we should do nothing to prevent it would be, to pick an analogy appropriate to this blog, like claiming that since we don’t know precisely the damage that will be caused by a US government default and therefore we should do nothing to prevent it.
Science doesn’t deal in proof, it deals in evidence. The overwhelming weight of evidence is that the planet is warming at an unprecedented rate that, if unabated by human action, will make life as we know it on this planet unsustainable in the next 100 years. The overwhelming evidence points to anthropogenic atmospheric carbon dioxide as a major driver, although anthropogenic methane, and methane released from clathrates and permafrost melting due to anthropogenic carbon dioxide release, will also be an increasing factor going forward.
I’ve posted a couple of links supporting the science behind these assertions. Happy to post more, but I respect the need to stay on topic.
“No one claims that the climate does not change.”
Climate change denialists claim that the recent dramatic increase in global warming has nothing to do with human activity.
“No one disputes that man has an impact on our environment including temperatures.
Climate change denialists deny that human activity is causing the recent dramatic increase in global warming.
What is questioned by climate change denialists is whether (1) the recent dramatic increase in global warming is happening, (2) human activity is the cause, (3) current climate modeling has any value at all, and (4) whether anything can or should be done to curtail current carbon emissions.
The overwhelming evidence from current published data is that (1) the recent dramatic increase in global warming is happening, (2) human activity is the cause, (3) current climate modeling has significant value, is getting better, and continues to point to the same or worse outcomes for the planet, and (4) something urgently must be done to curtail current carbon emissions to slow the catastrophic consequences of anthropogenic global warming.
Those who continue to allege that the current science is ambiguous about this are dishonest.
CoRev, since you continued to troll with your trigger word, I deleted your last two comments as spam and will continue to delete any further comments from you. Your claims about what “no one denies” are flagrant lies that you no doubt insist ad nauseum are “technically correct.”
CoRev has been banned from Angry Bear several times. My last discussions with Dan, Run and others with editorial control made it clear that any individual poster at their discretion can delete some or all of CoRev’s comments without consulting the blog runners.
Dan in particular has bent over backwards. Indeed for a while we had dedicated Open Thread: Climate Change essentially set aside for CoRev in hopes he wouldn’t jump every other Open Thread and even topical Posts. Didn’t work particularly.
My advice to posters is to not tolerate thread hijacking. If you want to try to reason with trolls, perhaps for the educational value of others, then do. Otherwise the same dashboard that allows you to post gives you the ability to monitor and delete comments that are off topic or straight out trolling.
Bruce:
I agree. Once you give an answer and the same comes back at you from the Troll, it is time to draw a line. It is constant and things go off in a different direction. I get really tired of it and have little patience.
Of course one can go back and find that when cost entered into an engineering decision every so often it goes bad. Back to Fukishima. If it had been considered probable for that high a Tsunami to happen then instead of cutting the hills down to put the plant in you could have built the plant on the existing sea fringe hills (look on google earth north and south of the plant to see them)
But however in the end it takes engineering solutions in any case for renewables it takes engineering to build the plants for efficiency it takes re-engineering the product. So unless you want to say you will live in the 18th century and you will like it or die you need engineers to come up with solutions to problems.
Continuing the comment an engineer is presented with a problem and a budget to solve the problem by higher authority (in business the boss in government the legislature). The engineer works to get the best solution to the problem within the bounds given. After all despite others thoughts for example safety and function are at least partly tradeoffs.
Who is going to pay? How much they are going to pay? And whether anything is to be done or not are all political and legal issues, not “engineering” problems. Of course engineers figure in the solution… IF THERE IS A SOLUTION. But there isn’t necessarily a solution and that includes engineering solutions.
Mr. Tillerson is confident that “something will turn up.”
“Mr. Tillerson is confident that “something will turn up.””
In engineering school (even at UT-Austin), they don’t teach that hope is a plan.
The issue is to define the constraints given to the engineers including budget etc. Of course it is not engineers that do this. However with the recent changes in cost of renewables vs non renewables, it does appear possible to get to a mostly renewable future. Note that energy storage is for example primarily an electrical and chemical engineering problem. Managing an AC grid with diffuse power sources etc, is an engineering problem.
If for example the results of the Mexican Solar option are true where it came in cheaper than non-renewables with no subsidy much of the problem of the electric grid can be reduced to engineering problems.
Of course this is greatly helped that the population in China are doing what the population in Pittsburg did in the 1940s and 1950s and the population of London did after the killer fogs of the 1950s, demanding clearer air of their leaders.
So there are actions taken today that are engineering that still attack low hanging fruit. Consider that LED’s are an engineering solution to the problem of more efficient lighting, which went on for about 50 years after Edison introduce the carbon filament lamp until the tungsten filament lamp came out in 1911. But if you look at the history of energy efficiency, recall James Watt’s claim to fame was a more efficient engine compared to the Newcomben engine which was only economic at a coal mine. Or the migration to higher pressure steam around 1800 and the whole evolution of the steam engine. The heat rate (btu/kwh of the Pearl Street Station was 130,000 btu/kwh, while the average of modern coal plants is 10,495btu/kwh, and combined cycle gas at 7878 btu/kwh. So engineers were given the problem of generating electricity more efficiently and they met it. A factor of 12 for coal plants and a factor 16 times for combined cycle gas.
Imagine how bad co2 levels would be if we generated electricty with 1885 technology. (Actually the price would be so much higher that a lot of uses would not happen)