Because people on the right tend to have more money than those on the left and it's already a tough existence making it work on the money they have. There's more debt across the US than there has ever been, more people living paycheck to paycheck, most people have little to no savings and are one medical accident or car accident from going into unsustainable debt.

Personally i think organic change from dirty energy to clean is good enough. The world economy is already a house of cards, if you force some heavy duty taxes to subsidize the green deals of the world it could tip to fail.

What about the risk of not acting fast enough though? It's not like the house of cards is going to be stable with increased heavy weather/natural disasters. According to these predictions, the Paris agreement is pretty close to optimal economical outcome. How is that not more beneficial for the average middle- to upper-class citizen than not acting and over time suffering more and more economical damage due to climate change?

The price of energy doubling here would collapse the economy and make us second to China, India, and probably even Russia.

Poverty would become rampant and investors would run to greener pastures.

And what mathematical arguments have you based this on?

Just subsidize renewables at the same rate as oil and coal. Suddenly our energy cost will plummet

Quantify accurately that risk?

That's the real issue here, we are operating on many assumptions with so many unknowns, with so many predictions varying from it's normal to sky is falling. Who's right?

I think the main issue with getting people to buy in is it's not personal enough. If i see a car coming at me 50km/hr and it will run me over i'm going to do something and get out of the way. If i'm told icebergs are melting 3 meters a year in Greenland, where i'v never been, it's not personal enough to care, and honestly this is probably how 90% of humanity operates. A middle class family has a mortgage, student loans, car payments, kids that constantly want the latest gadgets, etc. By the time it's all said and done, they really don't have that much cash that they can essentially donate for the greater good. And that's kind of what's being asked of them when it comes to climate change. Ask most people, even leftists really, do you think climate change is important they'll tell you probably yes. Then ask a subsequent question, what are you personally doing financially to combat it or if nothing then do you mind donating 100/month and vast majority will decline.

I do think this movement is a net positive for the world, because we should strive to be self sustainable and more environmentally conscious. Even though i hate the sky is falling folk i do think they serve a purpose of moving the needle to positive incremental change.

there is a left leaning libertarian niche for "right wing" environmentalists.

their goals tend to be more in line with preserving public lands for parks and such, but as consequences of global climate change begin to affect the daily lives of people i think we'll see more talk of suing corporations responsible.

It's not even about cost really, the true issue is that on a technological level, renewables are not a feasible replacement for fossils (yet).

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Abandoning fossils right now in favor of renewables would cause all of us to become poorer, less mobile and to lose comfort.
I'm all for adding renewables into the mix where it is economically prudent and technologicaly feasible to do so. The true crux is that this wont be enough if the climate models are to be believed.
So, at the end of the day, we're talking about a movement/ideology which tries to sell "sacrifice for the greater good" and "inevitable radical change into an uncertain future" to people, and that's naturally not very attractive.

It seems very logical to me that such a movement/ideology is gaining more traction with the political left, which emphasizes postmaterial values like fairness, cooperation and internationalism. On top, climate change is very welcome as a door opener for a radical restructuring of the economic system, towards a (more) planned economy, which obviously appeals to leftists. Similarly, it seems very logical to me that the message of the climate change movement doesnt play well with the political right, which emphasizes wealth, growth, economic freedom and national sovereignty.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Jan 29 2020 09:57am

Happened to me a few years ago: elected to buy energy from Starion a clean energy company, my power bill doubled from the usual 250-300 into the 500-600 range for a few months until I was able to be switched back off again...and was eventually offered a place as a plaintiff of a class action lawsuit that was won and we got a check back for like 24 bucks and am wary of electing to be part of a clean energy scheme again.

sry for the offtopic, but wait a second: your monthly power bill is in the 250-300 dollar range? what the actual fuck?!