Everything you thought you knew about how to fix the climate is probably wrong

According to the UN, around 11 billion people will live on earth by the end of this century. And the richer the developing world gets, the more energy these people need – and want – to have. Even if each person uses half as much energy in 2100 as the average Brit uses in 2022, we need to double the amount of energy produced globally.

In fact, it would be nice if we had a lot more energy per person – people should switch on their lights, drive goods to the market and children to school and heat or cool their homes. Countries with cheap energy in abundance can have more and better industries and are richer.

But providing all that energy to billions of people without wreaking havoc on the climate will be difficult. So it’s important to think about the most effective ways we can work—as individuals and as a society—to reduce the amount of carbon that our energy releases into the atmosphere.

There are several things we can do, but you can probably break them down into two main categories: we can change our own behavior; or we can donate money to organizations working for change. But which are the most effective?

The personal is political

When we think about what we can do to minimize climate change, we mostly think about how we can change our own behavior.

But there are changes that make a difference and there are changes that, frankly, don’t. “People say every little bit helps,” says John Halstead, a policy researcher at the University of Oxford. “But all big helps more.” For example, people unplug their phone chargers to reduce energy use. “But the energy you save by unplugging the charger all day is consumed by driving a second for a second,” he says.

Hannah Ritchie, research director at Our World in Data, who is writing a book on how to deal with climate change, agrees that too often we change the wrong parts of our behavior. “When it comes to lifestyle, there are some really big things that make a difference, but most of the things that we focus on don’t. Switching off the lights, eating local food, not using the tumble dryer – none of that makes a big difference.”

What does making a difference, she says, moving to a more plant-based diet, getting rid of the car or buying an electric vehicle, and not flying as much. The average Brit is responsible for around eight tonnes of carbon emissions per year. About a quarter of this was accounted for by transport. The food we eat and heating our homes make up much of the rest. Flying is a relatively small amount — around 8 percent — but for those of us who fly a lot, that number could be a lot higher, as each round-trip flight to New York equates to about a ton of CO2 per passenger. She also recommends installing solar panels on your home if you can.

Changing your behavior in these ways can have an impact, she says. “I look at it as a match with the wallet,” she says. “The example I use is dietary changes. The individual impact of someone going vegan or buying meat substitutes is minimal, but when you buy those products, you’re signaling that there’s a market here. They tell companies to innovate and flood the market. Voting with your wallet will give you technological advances in the products.”

It goes beyond the individual, she says. “I see this argument being made across countries,” she says. “The UK is only responsible for about 1 per cent of global emissions and people are arguing that decarbonising the UK would only affect emissions by 1 per cent, so what’s the point? But it’s not just about rich countries’ individual footprints, it’s about creating a low-carbon path for other countries to follow by making low-carbon energy or meat substitutes really cheap.”

A lever and a place to stand

But even taking that into account, there’s a limit to how much individual lifestyle changes can affect emissions. If you simply wiped off the face of the earth tomorrow, the UK would likely be reduced by around eight tonnes of CO2 emissions over the next 12 months. Yes, as Ritchie says, when we vote with our wallet we can influence other people’s behavior, but even then it’s a limited effect and has a big impact on our lives.

There are other things we can do, but again, some of these things make a big difference, others essentially don’t, and they’re not always what you think. Often people do things like pay to offset their flight emissions. But, says Halstead, that’s of little use. “When people think of donations,” he says, “they think of buying a flight ticket saying you can offset the emissions from that flight for £5 or whatever. These programs are basically bullshit – if it really cost a fiver to offset your flight, climate change would be easily solved.”

“But if you donate carefully,” says Halstead, “there are organizations that expect high impact.” He thinks of the “expected value” of an intervention – a 10% chance of saving 10 tons of CO2 is just as good as a 100% chance of reducing it by 1 ton.

The most important thing, he says, is to focus on organizations that have an impact on politics. “That’s because politics is so highly leveraged,” he says. “If you support an NGO that runs an advocacy campaign or produces research, you can change the entire behavior of an industry. I’ve seen case studies where NGOs have done that.” Philanthropic support, for example, has dramatically reduced wind and solar costs. And while it’s difficult to accurately quantify the impact, he thinks “$1 a ton is a pretty conservative estimate, pending.”

Benevolent Neglect

What Halstead specifically recommends — and the Founders Pledge, the philanthropic organization he works with — are organizations committed to innovation in neglected low-carbon technologies that can reduce the cost of low-carbon energy in the developing world. Over the next 30 years, the US Energy Information Administration predicts that most of the growth in energy demand will come from Asia. By 2050, the rich western countries of the OECD will consume only about a third of the world’s energy consumption. It is absolutely critical that zero-carbon forms of energy are cheaper for poor countries to produce and use than fossil fuels, especially coal.

The keyword there is neglected. Solar and wind power are getting amazingly cheap, and battery technology is improving fast, and it’s a virtuous cycle – they get cheaper, they get more investment, and they get cheaper again. But sun and wind aren’t right for everyone, and “we need to hedge against a world where they don’t thrive,” says Halstead. Likewise, the growth of electric vehicles is wonderful, but it’s already happening – donations can do more good where there are funding constraints or other obstacles.

“It would be nice if we had more nuclear power for many reasons,” says Halstead. “It’s not necessarily a matter of funding, it’s a matter of regulation so it’s not incredibly expensive and difficult to build.”

“There are other things too: hydrogen and zero-carbon fuels and enhanced geothermal, nuclear fusion, carbon capture and storage; Things that aren’t on the radar of many people but are potentially important.” The Founders Pledge recommends three charities in particular — the Clean Air Task Force, which works to create low-carbon energy systems for developing countries; Carbon180, which works on capturing carbon directly from the air; and TerraPraxis, which works on energy innovations, particularly nuclear power.

Porque no los dos?

None of this is to say that you shouldn’t make lifestyle changes also. Not least because many of them will actually make you better. “Some of them are easy and free,” says Halstead. “LED lights or electric vehicles — that saves money.” And as Ritchie said, you can significantly reduce your individual carbon footprint by reducing how much you drive, how much you fly, and how much meat you eat.

But your individual carbon footprint is only a small fraction of the problem. The main problem is that over the next few decades, billions more will want – and deserve – to live the lifestyles that the West has become accustomed to, and will need the energy to do so.

Even a small change in the likelihood that these people would use wind power or nuclear energy instead of coal could have huge, outsized impacts on the amount of carbon the world will produce. If you can afford the money – or the time – to support organizations driving low-carbon energy innovation, then for a few pounds a year you could potentially do more good than reducing your own carbon footprint altogether.