Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
About
Christology
Israel/Palestine
Publications
KermitZarley.com
Archives
Categories
- Angels
- Blog Description
- Book Reviews
- Christian Living
  - Unconditional Love?
- Christianity
- Christology
  - Deity of Christ?
  - Holy Spirit
  - Incarnation?
  - My Change
  - Trinity?
- Church History
- Current Events
- War on Terrorism
- Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
- Eschatology
- Ezekiel 38-39
- Last Empire
- Primitive Weapons
- Film Reviews
- God
- Golf
  - Billy Graham
  - Karsten Solheim
  - Lee Trevino
  - Major Championship Winners
  - Masters
  - Purpose
  - Ryder Cup
- Gospel Harmonization
- Interview
- Islam
- Jesus
- Literary Announcements
- Monotheism
- My Books
  - The Restitution of Jesus Christ
- Old Testament
- Politics
- Society of Biblical Literature
- The Bible
- Trinitarianism
- Uncategorized
FREE NEWSLETTER

Home
Progressive Christian
Religion News
Carbon Neutral Is the Future

Carbon Neutral Is the Future

Last updated on: November 27, 2020 at 8:23 pm by Kermit Zarley

Carbon Neutral Is the Future 2020-11-27T20:23:30-07:00 Kermit Zarley

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Manmade global warming is a scientific fact. The temperature of Earth’s atmosphere has increased about 2% since the Industrial Revolution began in the latter part of the 19th century. Scientists tells us that humans are almost the sole cause of this increase in Earth’s temperature. Yet global warming has become a divisive factor in American politics of late. That is, many millions of American deny that humans are causing this global warming. But I believe this denial of science will not last. Eventually, just about everyone in the world will realized that humans have been causing global warming.

Most people know from mere observation that humans have been polluting the atmosphere with greenhouse gases just by seeing and smelling the dirty air in some of the world’s largest cities, such as in China and India. It has had a detrimental effect on peoples’ health, especially those who suffer breathing difficulties such as asthma. One estimate is that air pollution causes early death for 7 million people annually.

Now, we are seeing the destructive effects of global warming as it changes weather patterns. There are more and greater glacier meltings, flooding, hurricanes, drought, forrest fires, and heat warnings. All of this gravely affects agriculture and alters animal habitats. In most parts of the world, spring now comes sooner and winter arrives later.

Most of manmade global warming is caused by the burning of fossil fuels. To counter this, nations are setting targets and passing laws to eventually attain a carbon neutral world. It will be a mighty, herculean task. For example, China is the world’s biggest air polluter of greenhouse gases. Yet, China’s President Xi Jinping announced late last year that China has set a goal of no greenhouse gases by 2060. The European Union likewise had already set a target of carbon neutrality by 2050.

Industry is the biggest cause of manmade global warming.

Transportation is a big cause of global warming due to the gasoline combustion engine. But nations are passing laws and setting targets to reduce these particular emissions. Emission-trading systems are being inaugurated, also called “cap and trade,” in which industries will be held accountable for exceeding their allotments to pollute the air. If corporations exceed their quota, they will be highly penalized financially. But they will have the option of reducing or negating such penalties by purchasing carbon credits from their competitors who emit less than their quotas.

Tesla is an example of a corporation that is overcoming global warming with its battery-operated, electric vehicles (EVs). In doing so, Tesla has recently become a disruptor of the auto industry. I have been an investor in Tesla for years. Last year I began saying, “Tesla will be the Apple of the next decade.” This year alone, Tesla’s stock has already increased over 500%. But it hasn’t been easy or guaranteed. Co-founder and CEO Elon Musk admitted recently that only 18 months ago, Tesla was “one month away from bankruptcy.” Musk had this vision to eradicate polluting transportation. But Tesla now consists of two parts: Tesla Automotive and Tesla Energy. Thus, Tesla is also reducing global warming by means of solar power, improving batteries, etc.

Tesla will be added to the S&P 500 on the stock market at the end of this year, which will be a big feather in its cap, because it finally has achieved the requirement of four successive quarters of profitability. But it could only do that due to its emissions credits it sold to competitor auto manufacturers who were exceeding their emissions quotas. For example, in each of the last two business quarters, Tesla sold nearly half a billion dollars of such credits to competitors, mostly to DaimlerChrysler.

Investors have been making a lot of money by investing in Tesla or just renewable fuels in general, such as solar or wind power. In contrast, the oil companies that used to be the great titans of industry are going down. Exxon Mobil used to be the largest corporation in the world by market capitalization. But now it has been surpassed by several IT companies such as Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon. Some of these former oil titans now acknowledge that they are some of the world’s largest air polluters and therefore are investing in renewable fuels. Thus, they see the future coming, a future of carbon neutrality.

In addition, investors are increasingly requiring funds in which they invest to be ESG, referring to Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance. About environment, they are requiring that funds only purchase stock in corporations that advocate sustainability of the environment, thus no oil stocks.

Also regarding transportation, nations are setting targets and passing laws in which they will be restricting the manufacturing and selling of combustion engine vehicles. Thus, in some nations there will be no more making and selling of such vehicles by the year 2040, or 2035, or 2030, or even 2025. And not long after some of these nations have so announced these target dates, they change them to a nearer date. The U.S. has not been doing, but the state of California has. Thus, in the future, there will come a time when gasoline vehicles are a thing of the past. For now, EVs are the future.

The U.S. is the second largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, second only to China. We produce 25% of all greenhouse gases in the world. Yet the U.S. has only 4.5% of the world’s population. Thus, the U.S. has been lagging behind the rest of the advanced nations in the world in reducing its burning of fossil fuels.

But no longer; President-election Joe Biden plans for the federal government to spend $2 trillion in reducing America’s emission of greenhouse gases during his four-year term. That, of course, is the exact opposite of what the Trump administration did. Trump denied global warming, said he would “bring back coal,” and got laws passed that were non-environmental benefits to the coal and oil industries, thus increasing U.S. greenhouse gases despite the fact that the COVID pandemic reduced travel.

Below is a chart by Our World in Data that shows the sources of global warming.

Previous Post

November 27, 2020

U.S. Supreme Court Rules for Religion Against Health

Next Post

November 29, 2020 Trump and Jesus on Being a Loser: Part One of Three

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Angels Billy Graham Blog Description Book Reviews Christian Living Christianity Christology Church History Current Events Deity of Christ? Disarmament Eschatology Evangelicalism Ezekiel 38-39 Film Reviews God Golf Gospel Harmonization Health History Holy Spirit Incarnation? Interview Islam Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Jesus Last Empire Literary Announcements Major Championship Winners Masters Monotheism My Books New Testament Old Testament Politics Primitive Weapons Ryder Cup Science Society of Biblical Literature The Bible The Restitution of Jesus Christ Trinitarianism Trinity? Uncategorized Unconditional Love? War on Terrorism

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What Christian group traces its origins to the Azusa Street Revival?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Lutherans Anglicans Pentecostals Methodists

Books by This Author Books by Kermit Zarley Blog

See All Titles »