I’ve spent ALOT of time the past few months trying to understand climate change and global warming, and how to effectively contribute. I’ve dug through 1000-page scientific reports, talked to experts, and basically tried to digest as much information as possible. I was surprised by how little I knew before. I’m convinced that, the more people who really understand the problem, the more effectively we’ll be able to solve it (or at least mitigate it).

So here’s a short animated video summarizing the whole issue. The problem, the consequence, the root cause, the solutions, and what you can do to help. All packaged in a fun and easy-to-digest way, same style as my other videos about Spotify Engineering Culture and Agile Product Ownership. The video is all based on solid scientific references, not speculation or rumours.

Please help spread it as widely as possible! Link to this blog post, or the youtube link: https://youtu.be/3CM_KkDuzGQ

I hope this video will inspire many people to make small changes, and a few people to make big changes. Who knows, maybe the next young Elon Musk is out there somewhere, just waiting for the spark of inspiration 🙂

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OK, here’s a (very) simplified summary of what I’ve learned about global warming after digging deep the past few weeks.

1. Global warming is a major threat to life as we know it. It’s ALOT worse than most people realize.
2. Global warming is caused (mostly) by increasing CO2 in the atmosphere.
3. The CO2 increase comes (mostly) from us burning oil & coal (“fossil fuels”). Adds about 20-30 billion tons of CO2 per year.
4. So we need to (mostly) stop burning oil & coal.
5. We burn oil & coal (mostly) for electricity and transport. Coal power plants, car/plane/ship fuel, etc.
6. We want to keep electricity and transport, but we also want to stop global warming, therefore we need to get electricity and transport without burning oil & coal.
7. We know how to do that (solar, wind, electric cars, etc). The technology has been figured out, and the prices are at the tipping point where oil & coal can’t compete economically.
8. So now we just need to hurry up and roll out those solutions! Every single reduced ton of CO2 counts.
9. Unfortunately shit is going to hit the fan either way (because it’s already launched so to speak), but at least we can slow it down, reduce the impact, and buy us some time.

So pull whatever strings you can to help out – technology, policy, economy, communication, etc. Inform yourselves & each other. People have varying degrees of discretionary time, money, knowledge, voting power, contacts, influence, and motivation. But the more people try to help in one way or another, the more difference it will make as a whole.

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