Is there any reason to be optimistic about it, or are we all doomed? As far as I’ve looked it up, the more optimistic projections predict a 1-2° global temperature rise in the next few decades, which is pretty bad.
Is it a smart decision to start moving to higher/colder regions yet? What can we do?
And is there a good resource or video essay or whatever for this? There is so much misinformation and fearmongering around climate change. It’s a hassle to weed out any trustable information.
As the other commenters have already shared, things are going poorly. An issue with climate change is that concrete consequences are delayed behind our actions, there is already more warming baked in. But I worry about the focus on the binary good or bad outcome on climate change and the people who say things like “it’s too late.” (fossil fuel astroturfing pushes this phrase btw). Climate change is not binary and it’s never too late for us to try prevent worse things happening.
Despite unfavorable political winds in some developed countries, there’s progress in developing nations and, most importantly, India and China. China is spending nearly $1 trillion/year on green energy and infrastructure. They clearly want to dominate the global green energy economy. India is adding big solar capacity too. And solar is also taking off across Africa, where off-grid diesel generators are being directly replaced with small-scale solar systems. Since electricity for solar is now the cheapest form in many areas of the world, it often pays for itself and keeps increasing as an attractive investment.
We thankfully already have the most of the technology needed to address climate change (carbon-free energy, energy storage, better power grids, more forests and less cattle). And green tech keeps getting better, I like the channel Undecided with Matt Ferrell to keep up with tech advancements. But no technological progress will be enough if fossil fuel companies keep drilling. As things worsen, the political appetites will also certainly change.