mad_drop_gek t1_j5wdwol wrote
There's a multitude of shortages coming up in the coming decades, from water, to fertilizers, to minerals, to mineral carbon and even radioactives. Climate change is a eufemism for humans exhausting a finite resource.
smurficus103 t1_j5xcwyv wrote
I felt like i was yelling into a void for 10 yearz, and here you are! Doin the thing! Thanks stranger.
mad_drop_gek t1_j5y7pdo wrote
You're welcome. The biggest issue is that humanity can only handle one existential crisis at a time, and badly at that. Even the results of climate change, now they become clear, will be a multitude of issues. On top of it scarcity will hit on many levels, needing solutions that we don't have. We have too much nitrous in the wrong place, and not enough in the right place. What little phosphor we have is being washed into the ocean. Whole counties are running out of water. Gas shortages in Europe last year shows how dependent we are of a resource we know we shouldn't use. This has far reaching impacts in our food supply chain, from fertilizer production to glass agriculture to coffee roasting. We're undecided whether we need to build more nuclear power, while that is based of a finite resource. More longterm solutions like thorium/molten salt, and fusion, are still 30 to 50 years down the road to become commercially viable. We're running out of options here, and there's still so many people stuck in the bystander effect, or plain denial..
Hmm_would_bang t1_j604qad wrote
Some of these shortages likely won’t be a massive issue. You can look to israel for saltwater treatment, they figured it out because they couldn’t be dependent on their neighbors not damming their fresh water sources.
It’s inevitable this investment eventually comes to the American southwest, and eventually spreads out through humanitarian efforts to developing nations experiencing drought.
Similarly, several other people in this thread have discussed the alternatives to modern fertilization.
In fact almost all of the issues with shortages likely won’t be a big problem has they have known alternatives in place. The cost/benefit from a strictly financial perspective just isn’t there yet to implement them. And as a result our natural resources continue to suffer
mad_drop_gek t1_j605jr9 wrote
Do you have any idea how much energy that desalination process costs? It is not a long term solution, unless energy all of a sudden becomes abundant. On top of that, explain that to any landlocked country, with no saltwater access. The deep and dark valley most of the developing world will need to crawl through will be horrendous.
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