Global co2 emissions are at an all time high.

Co2 parts per million are a stock, like the level of water in a bathtub. Annual emissions are a flow, like how strongly the water is flowing in.

The tub is fuller than ever before AND filling at the fastest rate ever.

The problem is that carbon energy is useful. So unless something globally beats almost all use cases then somewhere marginally it will be worth burning vs not burning it.

https://ourworldindata.org/co2-emissions

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gpt5 6 hours ago | parent [-]

It's a leaking bathtub. Half life of excess CO2 in the atmosphere is 30-100 years. So you need the water flowing in to continue to increase in rate (not just to continue flowing in), otherwise you reach a new equilibrium and the CO2 levels in the atmosphere stop increasing.

They do increase in rate as you said (for now).

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graeme 5 hours ago | parent [-]

That's a rather misleading statistic. Some is absorbed by oceans, where it acidifies. For land based carbon sinks (trees, soil, etc) any new carbon being deposited is competing with existing carbon in the carbon cycle.

If your stat had any sense then atmospheric carbon levels would rapidly plunge in a few centuries without humans burning carbon. They plainly don't do that.

	▲	gpt5 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Carbon levels are expected to plunge over a few centuries if carbon emissions drop. You are right the the ocean is the largest carbon sink, and it has the negative side effect of acidifying.