# Speculating on how much time we really have left - a climate change thread **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Tags:** climate-change\ **Created:** [March 15, 2026, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461 "2026-03-15T15:54:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/43 "2026-03-16T14:25:00Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > **Nobody (and certainly nobody in the USA)** has ever lived or worked in a neighborhood built for dry land that now sits in a foot of seawater. I wouldn’t put that as an absolute: > **[This Louisiana town moved to escape climate-linked disaster](https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240130-this-louisiana-town-moved-to-escape-climate-disaster)** > > The sinking Louisiana town of Isle de Jean Charles was forced to pack up and move to safer ground. Many more US towns may soon need to follow in their footsteps. ---
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/44 "2026-03-16T14:27:04Z")
> [@doomtastic](#): > > So the question is - when? My over/under is 2099, and I’m going with the under. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/45 "2026-03-16T15:28:14Z")
Good point. But they moved. Said another way, the old town was abandoned and a new one was built elsewhere. Perhaps with some subsidy paid to some folks, but surely not 100% of their costs. The USA will not be able to abandon every coastal town from Brownsville TX to Boston MA. Although they all will deserve abandoning. So lotta folks are going to be living in a lotta these collapsing infrastructures. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/46 "2026-03-16T15:37:04Z")
They will try very hard to protect NYC and maybe DC. They will both end up with storm walls and who knows what else. The subway systems will be pretty vulnerable. Even Superstorm Sandy showed that. Florida will be the most devastated IIRC. ---
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/47 "2026-03-16T15:39:30Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > So lotta folks are going to be living in a lotta these collapsing infrastructures. Somehow I just don’t see NY being as romantic as Venice. LOL ---
**Author:** ![Dinsdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/97f17d/32.png) [@Dinsdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dinsdale)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/48 "2026-03-16T16:54:00Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > They will try very hard to protect NYC and maybe DC. They will both end up with storm walls and who knows what else. I’m not readily pulling up a useful topography map. Wondering how far “inland” it might be worth relocating. Found this list of the elevations of major US cities. > **[Elevations of the 50 Largest Cities (by population, 1980 Census)](https://www.usgs.gov/educational-resources/elevations-50-largest-cities-population-1980-census)** If NYC and DC get inundated a couple of times, rather than pricey attempts to insulate them, it might make sense to relocate operations to Atlanta or Pittsburgh. The major Midwest cities and most of Texas will remain high and dry. Not sure what it would take to move ports “uphill”… ---
**Author:** ![doomtastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8c91f0/32.png) [@doomtastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doomtastic)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/49 "2026-03-16T17:05:45Z")
This is slightly tangential to the thread, but it’s a cool resource for those interested in seeing the projected impacts for various areas. [Sea Level Rise and Coastal Flooding Impacts](https://coast.noaa.gov/slr/#) (Miami is an interesting one to look at to see how the inundation changes at 1,2,..,10 ft of sea level rise - turns out at 10 ft, Miami becomes the new Florida Keys?). What’s harder to guess is how much the inundation of these areas will have knock-on effects. Obviously not great for real estate prices in these areas, but what (if any) critical infrastructure is at risk over the next couple decades and ~1-2 ft of SLR? How much will it cost the local economies as these people are forced to move? 🤷 If it were just SLR, I don’t think I’d be as concerned as I am about the time remaining. But unfortunately it’s also floods/droughts/storms/wildfires/extreme heat spread across most of the globe, and the economic and political chaos those will create as the costs accumulate. ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/50 "2026-03-16T18:15:54Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > I predict between 40 and 50 years. This is my prediction as well. However, we will learn to cope. ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/51 "2026-03-16T18:31:11Z")
As they say about bankruptcy - first it happens slowly, then [very] quickly. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/52 "2026-03-16T19:05:38Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > We passed that point 50 years ago. If we went to zero carbon emissions worldwide tomorrow, global warming will continue for a thousand years. We’ve already built in all that additional heating. Climate scientists are mixed on this. Some think that heating will stop almost instantaneously once we completely stop emissions, because the natural sinks are still not at equilibrium and so will immediately start to take out the extra carbon. I am not sure myself, since the ocean hasn’t fully stopped heating up under current GHG concentration, meaning it would still continue to warm up, plus who knows if the ice-albedo feedback and anthropogenic but not directly consumption-based emissions such as wildfires would continue to add to the atmospheric GHG. ---
**Author:** ![doomtastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8c91f0/32.png) [@doomtastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doomtastic)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/53 "2026-03-16T19:22:02Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > Climate scientists are mixed on this. Some think that heating will stop almost instantaneously once we completely stop emissions, because the natural sinks are still not at equilibrium and so will immediately start to take out the extra carbon. We are almost certainly not at equilibrium for the emissions we’ve already released. So there would still be some continued warming even if we stopped today. How far it extends beyond that is a very complicated question because a lot of the sinks as we currently understand them are faltering (e.g. the Amazon was a net emitter last year due in substantial part to land-use change by the people living there). If we stopped now, some might rebound (the Amazon likely if we left it the hell alone) while others (almost certainly for coral reefs, maybe/soon for the Greenland ice sheet) will continue to fail. It’s also something of a moot point since we’re still increasing rather than decreasing our emissions even for the “simple” sources like the electrical grid. We don’t even have good answers for how to transition things like heavy industry as far as I’m aware, let alone are we in a position to actually cut everything over at scale. Net-zero looks like a pipe dream at this point absent some techno-wizardry that can remove upwards of 40 billion tonnes of CO2 & equivalents from the atmosphere annually. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/54 "2026-03-16T21:44:24Z")
We couldn’t even learn to stop killing the planet, so learning to cope is totally out of the question… unless by learning to cope you mean thoughtfully digging our own graves and leaving behind a large sign that can be read from space that says “WE FUCKED UP. DO BETTER” ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/55 "2026-03-16T22:34:31Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > so learning to cope is totally out of the question Disagree. Things will get bad. And the standard of living that we are accustomed to will decline but we (humanity) have lived substandard before. But there will probably be solutions and technology invented and implemented that will mitigate the situation. We will cope. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2026, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/56 "2026-03-16T23:06:31Z")
Seems like Canada is going to be poised for an enormous influx of climate refugees. Depending on how well Canada handles this and filters out only the people it doesn’t want, etc. it could be an immense boon or immense burden to Canada. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2026, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/57 "2026-03-17T02:27:41Z")
> [@Lucas\_Jackson](#): > > But there will probably be solutions and technology invented and implemented that will mitigate the situation. One I’ve seen recently is [Direct Ocean Capture](https://capturacorp.com/captura-opens-new-direct-ocean-capture-pilot-plant-in-hawaii/) which extracts CO2 from the ocean. That’s a better way than capturing carbon dioxide from the air, since the density of CO2 in water is much higher. I don’t know how the technology works, but apparently it produces a stream of pure CO2. What we do with that stream is a good question, though. Assuming we find a way to sequester the CO2, we’ll need thousands of plants like the one I linked to. But as someone pointed out, we have thousands of similar-sized plants doing other things. So it’s not out of the question. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2026, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/58 "2026-03-17T14:20:40Z")
> [@Lucas\_Jackson](#): > > But there will probably be solutions and technology invented and implemented that will mitigate the situation. We will cope. I suppose it depends a bit one what one assumes “mitigate” and “cope” mean. I suspect some folks assume the word “mitigate” means “offset completely” and “cope” means “expend the effort to offset completely and still have plenty of good life left over. Really; it’ll be fine.” That’s not my opinion of those words, but some folks might think that … My take is like this: For sure we’ll _try_ to offset the damage and impacts. We might succeed by a few percent. But if it isn’t cheap, easy, and able to be done for private profit, it won’t get done. Most SLR “mitigation” will simply be a headlong fleeing inland, abandoning quadrillions of dollars of infrastructure which will decay in place and pollute the new coastline for centuries. And we’ll “cope” by putting up with whatever that does to world GDP, population, wealth / poverty distribution, etc. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2026, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/59 "2026-03-17T14:33:27Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Most SLR “mitigation” will simply be a headlong fleeing inland, abandoning quadrillions of dollars of infrastructure which will decay in place and pollute the new coastline for centuries. > > And we’ll “cope” by putting up with whatever that does to world GDP, population, wealth / poverty distribution, etc. Yep, the next 100 years ain’t gonna be pleasant. Where we end up after that is anybody’s guess, but it won’t be like the planet we currently inhabit and will probably be unrecognizable to anyone living today. The way we still spew greenhouse gases into the atmosphere as if it was an infinite sink absolutely astonishes me. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2026, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/60 "2026-03-17T15:06:43Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > The way we still spew greenhouse gases into the atmosphere as if it was an infinite sink absolutely astonishes me. Substantially anyone doing the spewing today won’t live to see much of the consequences. But they will absolutely positively see the adverse consequences of them personally stopping spewing today. It’s as simple as that. This novel **[The Ministry for the Future - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ministry_for_the_Future)** is interesting for its realistic characterization of climate change consequences. Can reccomend. It opens with a very plausible truly catastrophic but temporary event that kills IIRC 20M people in a week. Which _finally_ serves as a wakeup call the public hears and listens to. So now they demand that something to be done about AGW. Far too late to do much though. And right after that moment the book launches off into the world of optimism that the author (Kim Stanley Robinson) is famous for. Suddenly all of humanity grows up, realizes the common good is more important than personal selfishness, and everybody (or nearly everybody) gets on board with shared sacrifice and the abandonment of the capitalist economic “growth is good” model. IOW, the book becomes total fantasy. Fun fantasy as, like Star Trek, you inhabit a world with a different and better model of human in it. Then the book ends and suddenly you’re returned to the real world inhabited by the immature selfish v2.0 chimpanzees we really are. And the contrast is soul-crushing as you realize we collectively _can’t_ manage this problem. It’s simply not within the collective human behavior repertoire. ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2026, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/61 "2026-03-17T15:28:00Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > I suppose it depends a bit one what one assumes “mitigate” and “cope” mean. Well, of course everyone in this thread is guessing. The world is, what, 8 billion strong? I can say with as much certainty as possible, what ever greenhouse effect is enacted will reduce that number significantly. A 2023 study estimated that one point, 930,000 ago, our world wide population dropped to approximately 1,280 breeding individuals. We bounced back so maintaining our current population isn’t possible if global warming occurs, but it’s not needed either. There have been many failed scientific predictions. I’m not suggesting that global warming isn’t a big deal - it is - but I still say that the remaining population will find a way to cope with however this plays out. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2026, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461/62 "2026-03-17T15:37:03Z")
This is changing the debate it seems, no one in this thread was talking about the end of humanity. Mostly we’re talking about the huge impact this is going to have on our current civilization. Humanity will survive and the one trend currently that might minimize the damage is population growth is greatly slowing and we might even see a gradual population reduction. But such a large part of the overall population lives in coastal cities, that climate change is going to cause enormous issues in the next 75 years. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/speculating-on-how-much-time-we-really-have-left-a-climate-change-thread/1028461.md?page=4)