Here are some notes, hope they are helpful: Economic solutions: 1. Identify the sources of the most air pollution (factories that burn fossil fuels for energy; industries that use oil and coal to produce things; vehicles with internal combustion engines) 2. Decrease the supply of these technologies and products or decrease the demand for them There is a certain imbalance that comes with this. Some counties will harm the environment as there is no way to police every country, already established resources will be hard to demolish as people already got used to them and they are cheaper. That is until a new technology comes that is both effective and cheap. Or manipulating the markets with government subsidies, taxes, and regulations. Pollution represents a market failure - a situation where markets fail to produce the amount the society wants. Government interventions are advised. Another way to encourage people to pollute less is by providing price incentives (taxes, subsidies). Those incentives can encourage individuals to make choices that are better for the environment. Permit market - Setting a limit how much firms can pollute and allowing those firms to buy and sell pollution permits (Cap and Trade) Alternative energy sources usage is growing, but for the most part, they aren’t cheap enough yet, so the majority of our energy is likely to continue to come from non-renewable sources, at least for now. Since there is no time, efficiency with the usage of fossils is advised, but still unsure. The rebound effect says the benefits of energy efficiency might be reduced as people change their behavior. Leading to more usage and more pollution. There is still hope as there are constant ongoing discussions about this matter. Private companies and governments are also funding research into green technology. In the U.S. the American recovery and reinvestment act of 2009 allocated billions to fund renewable energy. China is also participating, being among the leading countries in renewable energy investments. Companies, as well as consumers, need to be mindful to reach an effective solution.

Environmental economics - how do we best deal with our natural resources? I. what can the government do? 1. enforce specific rules outside the market (just limit how much firms can pollute) 2. influence the market through price incentives a. add tax on products that cause pollution. (gasoline) b. subsidize products that reduce pollution (electric cars, renewable energy) 1 and 2 example: permit market such as cap and trade which set limits on how much firms can pollute and allow them to buy and sell permits (money goes from heavy polluters to lighter polluters) II. how can technology help? -since our current technology doesn't provide cheaper renewable energy, we can maximize the use of non renewable energy (energy-efficient cars) - hindrances: rebound effect - efforts to increase energy efficiency creates more available energy that only gets spent into something MORE and MORE. III. what actions are the world taking? 1. International treatys in which countries commit on reducing greenhouse gases emission. (UN negotiations) 2. funding "green" research into renewable energy. 3. changes can be brought by individual consumers, along with changes by the government and producers. (turn the lights off when not in use! and other small things).

This is why I wasn't 100% sold on the 5p charge for supermarket plastic bags. They ARE a way to reduce our impact on the environment, but this policy is being used merely as a political strategy: one year after the legislation was effective, politicians can point at graphs showing a huge decline in the use of plastic bags, which is a good thing. What they might not show you is the tiny dent this has made on the country's environmental impact. Reducing the use of supermarket plastic bags is a good thing, but when you are a government, with the power to make policies that will have a very large positive impact, shifting the brunt of the burden to consumers seems like the safest and least effective course of action.

I just finished off a dual masters program in environmental policy and environmental science out of IU and I just wanted to say awesome job! This was my focus in grad school and you nailed it. The only thing I would have added was a discussion on discount rates. I now have something fun I can show my family when they asked what I did in grad school.

Hello Adriene and Jacob! I’ve been watching the entire course. Everything totally awesome! I own a permaculture farming business. I would love to hear your thoughts on this concept and the multiplier effect it could have: In climate change there are two sides: pollution, and the degeneration of the biological systems that act as buffers, filters, and fertility regenerators. Focus could be drawn to: 1. The potential of carbon sequestration through permaculture style grazing and no till farming as a means to lower CO2. (Adds valuable externalities like nutritious food and fertile soil and less disease) 2. Small local waste treatment for biological residues and add value through compost and/or insect farm (adds value through organic fertilizers and insects for animal feeds) mainly to prevent water pollution 3. If polluting company serves a social goal (i.e: fossil fuels for energy), maybe taxing only the company for all the externalities isnt the best choice. We could debate cases in which the expense is passed to the consumer in the form of taxes so the company doesnt need to raise prices for their goods, yet the externalities were accounted for. 4. Government organized transition plan with support and subsidies for farmers transitioning away from chemical conventional farming. I really enjoy your course and am aching of doing thought bubbles too 🙂

This lines up perfectly as i'm starting my globalisation and sustainability class, cheering. Thankyou.

I would look into alternative ways of producing meat, since agriculture is one of the biggest culprits in regards to climate change. The fossil fuel industry needs to go to.

CrashCourse is the best channel on youtube. How I learn a lot in less than 10 minutes amazes me. Vielen Dank

For anyone actually interested in this topic I recommend reading an article in ecological economics (2015) “In Markets We Trust? Setting the Boundaries of Market-Based Instruments in Ecosystem Services Governance” by Erik Gómez-Baggethum and Roldan Muradian

Renewables not cheap enough is a half truth. In countries such as Chile and India, solar out competes coal/natgas. Areas such as Texas see wind power far cheaper than fossil fuels. Even the German government just said a few days ago that renewables are now cheaper than fossil fuels. It's just a matter of internalizing the externalities to such a point where the *real* cost of fossil fuels is fully realized in the price. As the price of renewables continues to drop and the price of fossil fuel regulations increase, more and more places around the world will see renewables become cheaper than fossil fuels. 2014/15 was the time when renewables started being cost effective in select markets. Soon, it will be all markets.

Great contribution to Crash Course you guys! But on the subject of environmental economics and externalities, I was sort of hoping to hear a little about value engineering and planned obsolescence. Also, I imagine it may be a little controversial to mention much about human rights violations as a tactic used by some large companies to exploit resources in developing nations and to discourage protesting by indigenous people. But those instances are very real and a major part of globalization and the growing economic inequalities you mention in some of the earlier episodes, which sadly do not often get enough media attention for most people to ever hear or even believe they are happening. Crash Course isn't exactly the news though, and even though it is part of the modern world's economic challenge, it would be pretty hard for you guys to cover something like that without getting sucked into some pretty heavy ideological debate. Either way, you're both doing a great job, and btw I dig the AC/DC belt buckles.

Thank you, and looking forward for more economics classes...

What's wrong with nuclear energy??? I think the best case scenario is to switch to nuclear short term, and have a long term plan to switch to renewable energy(solar, wind, hydro, wave, etc.)

We started exactly with this topic in school today, very helpful video!

Nice topic. On the side note, the animation of John, Craig, Stan and Hank on a vacation is pretty funny :)

The best part of this videos was Hank dancing! LOL

Yay! Glad they partially covered environmental economics. Next step, Ecological Economics! Hopefully..

Top notch animations for this one. I particularly enjoy all the hula dancing and cartoony cameos from other CC personalities. Hula on, Hank Green.

Thank for the economics series ❤️

omg Hank at 6:10 had me dead ! Amazing work 😂😂

I really want to see an updated version of this episode.

are you guys planning to cover geographical, urban and regional economics anytime soon? because those are highly neglected parts of economics though have amazing insight into development and institutions. also it will help me get through my course

if Hank and John would sell their homes, I guess there would be less green' houses (gases)

I am subscribing this video. It is really good! I am learning really much.

nice job tackling such a sensitive topic and educate people. We can not develop policies to combat environmental challenges without considering economics.

you have no idea how happy i got when he said trinidad and tobago :'(

YES! I've been waiting for environmental topics since I requested it on video 1.

I like the incentives approach

I'm experiencing UNNATURAL cold climates in my home country, it never went below 26 degrees Celsius before, although i do love it~ but now i fear for summer.

I have been very impressed with this crash course so far but I often find myself frustrated with the lack of updates. I hope this will improve this year.

wow amazing material!

Nice vid. The only feedback I'd like to give is: the ACDC belt buckle came off a little strong.

Thanks for the video. Hank's hips don't lie!

Tennessee Valley Authority making me proud of my state in a little way.

@5:42 That harmful emission though. :D ThoughtBubble! I saw what you did there.

"Kick over a barrel of oil and light it on fire"

YES - IT WAS ADOPTED! Now lets all make this happen ^_^

glad that you mentioned how it isn't just up to the individual, but also markets and governments to solve this, as I've been saying this for awhile. Vegetarians, for example, are always trying to convert everyone to their diet and acting like they're saving the world (or at least, the animals), but the truth is, as far as I'm concerned, it's not necessary to go to such lengths when what we should be focusing on is how those markets are run.

Hella informative thanks a ton

Thanks a lot!!! it's cool.

Haha big up to Trinidad and Tobago! That made my day!

Picking CO2 wasn't a great example. Should have stuck with SO2 emissions and the Clear Air Act since there have been a lot of economic analysis of it done.

OMG I COULD NOT TAKE HIM SERIUSLY WITH THAT AC DC BELT

Is this the last episode? I only want to binge watch when it is finished.

ya'll should talk about marginal propensity to consume, and similar topics :)

The primary cause of high greenhouse gases isn't factories or oil usage, it's the byproducts of animal agriculture. Not only is it responsible for air pollution, but it's also the cause of desertification, deforestation, and water pollution.

There's finally a crash course video on me, Captain Planet! Remember, the Power is Yours!!

Kindly, make the crash course of Financial Accounting and Business Management.

"I'll just ignore this entire video." -Both Trump and AOC

Hula Hank is now my favorite thing.

How about an energy inefficiency tax on houses which gets added to your council rates? The more efficient your house, the lower the tax.

I was just listening to green funds topic, it is a good program once implemented , but I think we have to be quick to give out resources to rural communities because they are among the people who are most affected by climate change. It is too much of negotiations without action.

Make your move, world! Here in Brazil we are already 85% on renewable energy :P Apareçam BR's!!!

Dude's AC⚡️DC belt buckle for the win.

Yes!

Please, consider doing a video on stock market

the guy is such a rebel with ACDC belt in the beggining

I like how fast they talk

One of the things that need to be addressed the most is cities. Cities are planned and build around the idea that everyone owns a car, and thus everyone must own a car in order to get around because the distribution of essential services and workplaces is made for cars. We build everything important within the downtown area where few homes are available, but lots of stores and offices, and then we spread the homes in a 20-30 km circle around this downtown area. That's way too huge. Cities need more common transportation services and more cellular layouts. In the ideal city, everything you need in order to live should be available to you within a 15 minute walk away from your home. So instead of having one big downtown for every city, we have 20 micro downtowns surrounded by homes and everyone can just walk to their neighborhood's centralized service and work area. This would alleviate the need for vehicles in our everyday life. You would still need a car every now a then to go see your parents that live in the next city, but that can be easily solved by renting one. Or you could still own a car but just not use it as much. I've made the relatively annoying sacrifice of not wanting a car in my life. That means I have to use the bus, the only common transport available in my city, to get around. That means when I go grocery shopping, I can't hop between 5 different grocery stores to get the best deals. I just have to go to the nearest one (30 minute away by foot) and go back with a light enough haul to carry by hand (30 minutes back uphill with food bags, great exercise actually.) And when I need to go all the way to the end of town to visit a friend or get an item from a store that's not available anywhere else, I have to plan around the idea of spending 1-4 hours just moving towards and back from those places. Distances matter. Not having a car sucks a lot, but I save a lot on the costs of owning one and my conscience is cleaner. It wouldn't be as annoying if the city I live in had a more thoughtful distribution of services and my employer didn't build the freaking building where I work 5 mins outside of the actual limits of the city (by car, which would take me 1 and half hour to reach on foot, thankfully there's one bus line that goes there.) The assumption that everyone has access, by means and choice, to a motorized vehicle makes it REALLY HARD to backpedal to a day an age where such luxuries wouldn't feel mandatory, but we somehow HAVE to. Also we need to eat less meat and look at alternative means of producing it that pollutes less and we need to rely as much as humanly possible on local economies. Global markets require global transportation of shit tons of stuff. Again, distances matter and moving all this around is incredibly wasteful. Yet we are still, to this day, pushing the markets into that direction. Because cheap labor is awesome for profits and consumers! Yay for suicidal capitalism philosophy!

6:45 Errrr, December 2015 has passed already....

Is there going to be more in this series?

you should watch "the venus project " get some new and fresh ideas!

I think the idea that the world should have internationally environmental police in charge of monitoring factoriies' activities of discharging waste and punishing them if there's a problem emerging is really interesting. The United Nations could make the idea into action.

I know this is an economic series, but it would have been nice to mention nuclear energy in the mix of alternative energy sources. Getting that idea out there is a step in getting us off fossil fuels completely in a reasonable time frame.

Scotland just recently hit 98% of its electricity consumption is renewable energy from wind farms, demand is 1.85 TWh and wind farms generate 1.82TWh. It’s aim is 100% by 2020 smashing its target in comparison to its British counterparts

That belt :)

The environmental police that punishes countries who pollute more might come from developed countries like US, Canada & UK. They might impose trade barriers or other obstructions to countries that don't take measures to reduce their pollution.

5:41 Where's Phil?!?! And Adrienne and Mr. Clifford?!

good educated video

Also with hybrid cars, that's the problem with the waste in both the old and new car. Electric cars result in batteries that are hard to recycle (after they permanently die).

animal farming is responsible for twice the carbon emission than fossil fuel here in the US. In CA, agriculture also uses up to 80% of its water supply. While greenhouse gas from cars and factories is a problem, the way we produce food is a bigger one.

"treaty that could be adopted in 2015", we're in 2016 hhahaha

that belt buckle though

thanks

No mention of public transportation? There are things like buses and even newer model electric trains that can cut down on pollution by allowing people to use the same vehicle and put less pollution into the atmosphere. As we switch to electric solutions and make our electricity generators cleaner, everyone benefits.

I'm optimistic about geothermal energy.

Any update on the climate agreement?

Nuclear power + electric vehicles = saving our planet

You mentioned Trinidad 😊 🇹🇹

How to address the inequality issue between emerging economies and/or or southern nations which seem to take the brunt of the climate change damages? And adding insult to injury, how could anyone argue for grandfathering policies when the west is responsible not only for most of the emissions but aim to give themselves special exemptions because of it?

In my opinion Public Transportation is the best way to combat car emissions. Get rid of urban sprawl, build up, all that stuff

I think you CrashCourse guys need to watch a documentary on netflix called 'Cowspiracy' - there is a very strong case for cattle agriculture resulting in far more pollution than any of this.

Will there be an environmental science series?

thorium reactors seem to be good, and hydro electric, solar&wind(to a lesser extent, hopefully) could also help. and for industries like mining, logging, and farming they can use bio-diesel&motorsport vehicles can be the only source of carbon until batteries are powerful&light enough to naturally replace gas. I also hope we'll invest in quality mass-transit, cause I personally don't enjoy driving, and bullet trains are awesome.

15% of energy consumption being renewable energy in 2040 is a gross underestimate - as is often the case, we largely underestimate what can happen in the next 10 years. Not to mention that 2040 is more than 20 years away, and solar energy just this year is almost catching up to fossil fuels in cost efficiency...

A question about the rebound effect: why would the consumer increase consumption as a result? I don't understand why purchasing a fuel efficient car would lead to something like a trip to Hawaii. Also, why would fuel efficiency saving money lead to the purchase of combustion engine ran cars?

It'd suck if those renewable grocery bags ended up causing more pollution than the regular cheap grocery bags, but when has recycling EVER backfired on us? :^)

I'm pretty amazed that this didn't talk about the US gas subsidy...

make a series on the stock market

Nice

Let's talk about lessening demand. What are the biggest polluters. Industry, oil production. What are the biggest demands, cars. What schooling do people receive while in school, STEM. So people go into these fields. Why do people need cars. The nonavailability of the things they need where they are. Local economy. Drive to work, then drive to grocery store, drive to clothing retailer, and then home. Drive to the bank to pay mortgage, and taxes. In all of that gasoline is used. Huge demand. In all of that no one could work on their own land growing a portion of the food they use. Or start sustainable agriculture to produce clothing where they are. Much of the clothing that is sold is made out of country, and is synthetic (made from oil), and out of country(no accountability on what is produced). Need to get people back to farming, producing what is needed where it's needed. Start new businesses that produce sustainable products. Get away from cheap fashion.

There is one big thing consumers can do: Don't fly! Flying is one of the environmentally worst things one can do. Sadly, it's subsidised, which is why it's so cheap. But if we care about the environment, we'll still try to find other ways or have our holidays somewhere nearby. I'm a little sad you didn't mention this, it's such an important thing and few people know about it.

was that Hank Green in the hula skirt? :)

Stop the destruction of rainforest... Everyone seem to forgot that. Less Pollution won't be enough

while having one person bring a reusable bag to the grocery store doesn't make much of an effect having MILLIONS of people bring reusable bags that makes a difference. A good reusable bag can save the use of 3 plastic / 2 paper bags (coming from experience). I think encouraging consumers to make small adjustments can have a big impact.

Was that Captain Planet in the Thumnail?

Yall keep flashbanging me with that white background

Environmental Econ : Finding the right incentive that can make market do something good or at least not doing something bad for the environment.

can you do a crash course on brexit explained

Cowspiracy is a very thought-provoking documentary about agriculture and its environmental impact.