Large ships emit a lot of sulphur oxides (SO~x~). E.g. cruise ships emit more than all cars of Europe. SO~x~ is not a greenhouse gas, but it’s a nasty pollutant nonetheless.

[–] philm@programming.dev 1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

They emit a lot, but they transport ... a very lot. Trucks are higher emitters per comodity.

Still both should be powered by something else like hydrogen (more interesting for ships I guess) or batteries...

And cruise ships should be IMHO taxed so high (the tax should probably directly go to countermeasures), such that only very rich people are able to (not that I grant them the fun, but they should finance this climate disaster in every possible way...)

[–] staindundies@lemmy.world 0 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Based on what a reasonable carbon price should be, I don't think you would need to tax them to oblivion. They would just need to pay their fair share.

This website suggests that it is about 0.4 tonne of CO2 per passenger per day. Canada's current carbon tax is $65 per tonne. So a 7 day cruise would be $182 per passenger in carbon pricing. This is just ballpark and yes you can argue that carbon prices should be higher.

[–] hglman@lemmy.ml 0 points 2 years ago (1 children)

We are quickly arriving at an unpayable bill.

[–] philm@programming.dev 1 points 2 years ago

For whom though? I think if your product is going to be very expensive because of that you,ll try to find ways (less carbon emissive) to make it cheaper, and for others, who have low emissions already, they get an advantage. Also rich people generally emit much more carbon than poor people.

I'm a little bit tired of the argument, that everything gets expensive, like the money just goes to nirvana, it's a tax and a tax should steer industries (mostly) to do the right thing (in this case emit less CO2). The money can go directly to people e.g. in the form of a universal basic income.