Prices are a great incentive.

In Germany, 1 kWh of electricity costs roughly 3x as much as 1 kWh of gas. That doesn't make heat pumps very attractive. Historically the differences were even worse.

Relying on people individually making choices that are better for the environment at a disadvantage for themselves is not going to work.

What we should do is make gas four times more expensive through taxes to guarantee the poor never vote for the progressives again. Unironically.

A gas furnace produces at most 1 kWh of heat from 1 kWh of gas. A heat pumps produces 3-4 kWh of heat from 1 kWh of electricity. If electricity is 3x as much as gas per kWh the heat pump should be less expensive to operate.

Plus, it also gives you AC which comes in handy if you live someplace where you want AC.

> If electricity is 3x as much as gas per kWh the heat pump should be less expensive to operate.

This would be true if heat pumps were free. But "less expensive to operate" needs to justify cost of installation over some measurable period of time. If electricity is 3x more expensive than gas, and the heat pump is 3-4x (2.5-3.5x realistically) then you're barely squeeking by except on the days when the pump is most efficient (when it's already warm out). That 3.5 - 3 leaves 0.5, amortized over the lifetime of the heat pump...might not even pay for installation.

So, make heat pumps free or energy cheaper, I guess.

You wait until your existing heating system reaches its end of life and then you consider switching.

The way a good heat pump works is that you can get about 3-5kwh of heat out of 1 kwh of electricity. So, they can save money over gas even though electricity is more expensive per kwh. And of course gas prices fluctuate quite a bit. Right now Germany is low on gas and gas prices are going through the roof because of the situation in the middle east.

Here in Germany this issue is lack of policy, financing, and a lot of people are renting. I actually pay about > 100/month for gas. I live in a 20 apartment building with a big furnace in the basement for the whole building. A heat pump would be cheaper to run but you'd have to do a big one for the whole building. This is actually a good thing. Big heat pumps can be quite efficient. It's probably cheaper than having to install 20 heatpumps for 20 apartments.

But buying and installing heat pumps costs money. Technically, it is actually an investment (i.e. it has an ROI). If you do this collectively as a building, you'd do it to lower your monthly bills. This is something that should be possible to finance out of those savings (at least partially). That's literally why private home owners install heat pumps and get their money back in 6-10 years typically. Faster if they also invest in solar. And get an EV that also powers from those panels.

But this where things break down in Germany. You need consensus. And financing. And there are home owners that can block things and it's their renters that pay the heating bill so the owners don't care. And so on. And if you are renting, you are not going to pay for this either. So, everybody just coughs up the money every month without even questioning it. My apartment doesn't even have a thermostat or a smart meter for electricity. Apparently that's normal in this country. Germany is just deeply bureaucratic and inefficient. For all the talk about environment, they can't be arsed to do what the rest of the world did decades ago: save some energy with smart meters.

Policy could help here. Mainly clearing up bureaucracy. And maybe some more subsidies/incentives (those already exist) or low interest financing. And a clear political goal to vastly reduce expensive gas imports. Even if the electricity for powering these heat pumps would come from gas powered electricity plants, it would still require a lot less gas. And of course Germany has lots of wind power. I think other countries in the EU are a bit further with their thinking than Germany on this front. On paper it having lots of apartment buildings like mine actually means it is fairly straight forward from a technical point of view to upgrade these buildings.

If only the German infrastructure hadn’t been built for Nordstream…

In France, with Nuclear power and renewable it’s 20% lower.

Prices also depends on who you want to give power.

germany is an excellent example of an industrial powerhouse imploding their country by adopting the stupidest power strategy possible. Just utterly incomprehensible.

Reduce consumption of farmed animal products to zero.

And don't fly

COVID proved that not flying barely made a dent in the global emissions.

Sure, if we never fly again and reverted to living like a medieval peasant, maybe things will kinda work out.

During COVID, airlines flew empty planes back and forth at a loss just to keep the right to their established routes and air ports.

What nonsense. I certainly feel like a medieval peasant sitting in a high speed train crossing a large country while I read a book for a few hours, costing three hours of work at the median salary if you book your ticket far enough ahead. (They also allegedly run on wind energy, but of course that's creative accounting and another industry is simply attributed the corresponding amount of coal/gas electricity.) Traveling is accessible, fast, and comfortable. The main expense is the hotel(s)

And eat vegan and regional produce

And don't build things out of concrete

And better get a few room mates

My impression is that flying on a commercial plane produces less CO2 than driving? So if your only options are drive vs fly, I think flying is the correct choice -- is that right?

It's code for "don't travel, especially long distance"... because most people would simply not be willing to make many trips if the trips took as long as the non-flight option would require.

It's about 60 mpg per passenger to fly domestically and 90 mpg per passenger to fly internationally.

If you have a family of 4, you can think of it as the equivalent of a 15 mpg vehicle for domestic flight and 22 mpg vehicle for international flight. So somewhere in the range of a full-size pickup truck.

But -- when you fly, you go very far. If you go on vacation to Hawaii from San Francisco once a year with your family, that's the equivalent of driving a Ford F-150 for 5000 miles. If you visit India or China that's 15,000 Ford F-150 miles! In a single trip, more than what most people drive in an entire year!

So you can make a big difference just preferring local vacations instead of remote ones.

I think there should be a progressive flight tax. The more flights you've taken, the more the next flight should be taxed.

That should allow anyone to do that once-in-a-lifetime trip to a far-away country they've always dreamed of, but discourage people from flying often.

A lot more fuel is needed during take-off and landing than during cruising, making the number and frequency of flights more significant than the distance.

Flights represent 3% of CO2 emissions. It's nothing. A tiny drop in the bucket.

> Switch to EV

Most people can't afford one

> -Migrate from gas appliances (range, furnace, water heater) to electric (induction, heat pumps)

Electricity is considerably more expensive, people that leave paycheck to paycheck would not be able to afford it

Here are somethings YOU can do personally to help:

- Never fly in an airplane again

- Never use ANY vehicle again, walk everywhere(yes EVs also pollute)

- In the winter, don't turn on the heat.

- Eat only vegetables and things you don't need to cook

- etc

If you are not doing ALL OF THESE you have no right on telling other people how they produce their CO2.

It's the year of our Lord 2026 and people are still making personal responsibility pitches to fix the CO2 levels which haven't been seen in 300 million years

What would you have them do instead?

Not OP, but my understanding is that voting for politicians who prioritize more sustainable policies and advocating for industry regulation to cut down on things like single-use plastics (or promoting EV use/infrastructure build outs) has a much bigger impact than recycling or not flying.

I (unfortunately) just don't think it's pragmatic/reasonable to expect enough people to make personal sacrifices/reduce QOL to make a dent. It's a tragedy of the commons, and we need some form of reasonable regulation to cut down on the worst offenders (probably carbon taxes) while we invest heavily in improving the technology so it makes financial sense to switch.

Renewables have come so far in the past decade and are now competitive with fossil fuels in terms of pricing. As the technology continues to become more efficient and cheaper, we'll likely start to see significant drops in emissions in addition to cheaper energy.*

*Assuming the US elects a rational adult to the presidency in 2028.

The number one solution is obvious and I don't know why nobody talks about it: mandate work from home whenever possible.

Daily commute represents 20% of CO2 emissions, it's an insanely high number, and it has an incredibly easy, already tested thanks to COVID, solution.

People will say "but what about the shops that will close". They won't, they will relocate in residential neighborhoods where people now live AND work.

All the potential issues people might raise actually disappear as WFH becomes the new normal and not a potentially temporary state like it was during COVID.

Even if only 50% of jobs can be done from home, that's an instant 10% reduction JUST from commute. But in reality it'll lead to a much larger decrease, with less spending on fast-fashion, more proximity businesses, etc.

Live smaller. Look examples from cage living from say Hong Kong. You can survive in capsule. You should not really ask for more space.

> Switch to an electric vehicle

I can't afford it. For context, I paid £500 for my current vehicle back in 2020. My bills have only gone up since, but my salary has not.

> Migrate from gas appliances (range, furnace, water heater) to electric (induction, heat pumps)

I can't afford that either. When I got my home assessed, switching to heat pumps requires replacing all the radiators in my house and extra insulation, etc. My gas boiler does have a built-in electric induction system, but it's only used when the tank is cold.

> If your power grid isn’t clean, add rooftop or balcony solar

I can afford the solar panels, but I can't afford the battery storage, nor the installation, and my area does not allow for an inverter connected to the main grid.