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Comment by Swizec | Hacker News Reader

Yes this is weird and also may be exactly what we need to do.

Here’s a few politicians from various countries explaining, basically, ”Look we need to develop. If you need us not to cut down the jungle, you should pay. The economic activity needs to come from somewhere. We can’t live in poverty forever”

https://time.com/6233998/brazil-indonesia-rainforests-climat...

https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/where-is-the-money-brazil-...

Think of it as money paid for conservation. Then it all makes sense.

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Except the Western nations/companies who buy the credits no longer have to reduce their emissions.

It’s great that Liberia has an incentive to conserve its forest. It’s not so great that doing so gives the rest of the world a license to pollute.

And it's unclear who is even responsible for making the final decision on whether the 'licensed' forests have been degraded in any way 30 years from now, and what authority they have to do anything.

The rest of the world had a de-facto license to pollute to begin with.

> Think of it as money paid for conservation. Then it all makes sense.

...And this payment can be used by the buyers to justify destroying the climate elsewhere, in a more efficient way.

I mean something is better than nothing?

Climate change is one of those things where asking for perfection is the perfect way to ensure nothing happens. This is a common lobbying tactic aimed at preventing change. If that’s not your intention, I recommend a different approach – encouraging anything that might help.

> I recommend a different approach – encouraging anything that might help.

Well, that's the point. I do not believe this is helpful, and I do believe this takes the space of other actions: in terms of not discussing the alternatives and in terms of taking time and effort to implement, both of which are in limited supply.

> Climate change is one of those things where asking for perfection is the perfect way to ensure nothing happens.

It's also one of those things where even the most watered down plans are not sufficiently acted upon, and where every target eventually ends up not being respected.

I'm all for compromise, but it takes two to compromise. And, as you mentioned, one side is not lobbying for compromise.

Vs destroying everything everywhere. But hey, gotta pump up more humans.

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