CO2 emissions have dropped 17% due to people staying at home, but that means 83% remain. The Guardian article quoted below describes the problem in terms of 'behavioral' vs. 'structural' emissions, but aren't 'structural' emissions just caused by behavior at the level of business and industry, where energy-use is much more intense?
When you drive a car or set a thermostat to heat or cool a room or building, you are operating a machine. Likewise, when a foundry worker turns on an arc to melt down scrap metal, he or she is also operating a machine, only at much higher levels of voltage and amperage, which thus consumes more energy. Everywhere people are operating machines, energy is being consumed, whether the use of those machines is defined as 'behavioral' or 'structural.'
In short, it's all people operating machines for various reasons and purposes.
Quote:The experience of the crisis so far has shown that changes in behaviour by individuals – such as not flying, working from home and driving less – can only go part of the way needed to cut emissions, as even the lockdown measures left the bulk of emission sources intact, she said, adding that bigger shifts are needed to the way people produce and use energy.
“Just behavioural change is not enough,” she said. “We need structural changes [to the economy and industry]. But if we take this opportunity to put structural changes in place, we have now seen what it is possible to achieve.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/may/19/lockdowns-trigger-dramatic-fall-global-carbon-emissions
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