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> If you took a province of China with 200 million inhabitants, it would be an extremely responsible country compared to a country of similar size. Having such

by aianus 9y ago

> If you took a province of China with 200 million inhabitants, it would be an extremely responsible country compared to a country of similar size. Having such an enormous population and population density relative to Western countries is irresponsible. I don't agree that you can just divide by population and say they're fine.

dmuch 9y ago
huh? The question is whether a group's behavior is irresponsible. Are you saying that merely existing is irresponsible? And if so what exactly follows from that, China already has relatively low birth rate...
macmacaka 9y ago
I don't get your point. Who are referring to are not being responsible here? The Chinese government or the Chinese people? If the former, they installed one-child policy with the sole purpose of population restriction, sounds pretty "responsible" to me. If the latter, are you suggesting as a people, maybe the Chinese shouldn't breed as many, to, say, leave space for other people?
- elefanten 9y ago
  Yes, it's not particularly productive to factor China's large population into comparisons of current responsibility. But GP has a valid point in pointing out that it's not reasonable to compare the entirety of a rich developed country to a low-density slice of China, which is very likely using fewer resources because of scarcity and underdevelopment rather than greater than average responsibility.
- aianus 9y ago
  If I choose to drive 1000km that I don't have to drive in a 35mpg Prius I am not more environmentally conscious than someone who drives 200km in a 10mpg Hummer. Similarly if I have 10 kids instead of 2. Anyways, I should have said "was irresponsible" since those decisions were made by their ancestors a while back and so there's not much more they can do about it now.
  - justicezyx 9y ago
    The analog is pretty unreasonable. It sounds like 1000km Prius driver has an option to drive only 200km. But they may not have. I.e. a poor lower middle class worker needs to drive everyday for work, while a millionare might choose to stay at home being environmental friendly. But he might be using too much electricity... Plus, you cannot just bash Chinese government of killing baby, while at the same time calling them environmental irresponsible...
bildung 9y ago
> I don't agree that you can just divide by population and say they're fine. CO2 output per country is not a reasonable metric. If we just split China into its provinces, does that make the problem go away? After all, each of the new countries now has a pretty small CO2 output.
- philipkglass 9y ago
  The sustainability of CO2 emissions is measured in terms of emissions sources divided by its emissions sinks. A ratio above 1.0 means long term increases in atmospheric and oceanic CO2. The further above 1.0 we are, the less sustainable. To make a very crude approximation, terrestrial emissions sinks scale proportionally with area. (Slightly less crude: sinks scale with forested area.) Generally speaking, countries need to have low emissions per unit area to be sustainable. Having low emissions per-capita but a high population density is no more sustainable than low population density and high emissions per-capita. China has land area of 9328246 km^2 and emitted 10641789000 tons of CO2 in 2015: that's 1141 tons/km^2/year USA has 9147590 km^2 land area and emitted 5172338000 tons CO2: 565 tons/km^2/year Canada has 9093507 km^2 land area and emitted 555401000 tons CO2: 61 tons/km^2/year EDIT: this was not intended to show China as "the worst." Belgium, for example, emits 3324 tons/km^2/year. On one hand this leads to philosophical issues of justice like "luck egalitarianism": is it fair that Canadians, by accident of birth, have so much more headroom to emit sustainably than people born to the south or east of them? (Is it fair that any nation's citizens enjoy advantages from their own country's natural resources? I tend to think "yes, it's fair enough" but people may reasonably disagree.) On the other hand, the pragmatic issue is that most countries are emitting CO2 faster than their geographic area can sink those same emissions. Certainly the largest political blocs are emitting unsustainably. The object of measuring emissions is ultimately to control them, not just to identify the party that deserves the loudest booing while we wreck the climate together. The USA, China, India, EU: none of them is "fine" and all need to make significant progress before their emissions are balanced with their sinks. (Not all of the effort needs to be on abating sources, though that's where the low hanging fruit is right now. Increasing sinking rates with afforestation, promoting soil carbon stores, and/or silicate weathering are also viable options.)
  - 9y ago
groby_b 9y ago
* China: 142 people/sq mile. * Italy: 197 people/sq mile * Spain: 210 people/sq mile * Germany: 235 people/sq mile * Belgium: 343 people/sq mile * United Kingdom: 650 people/sq mile Yeah, their density compared to Western countries is truly irresponsible.

by aianus 9y ago

dmuch 9y ago

huh? The question is whether a group's behavior is irresponsible. Are you saying that merely existing is irresponsible? And if so what exactly follows from that, China already has relatively low birth rate...

macmacaka 9y ago

I don't get your point. Who are referring to are not being responsible here? The Chinese government or the Chinese people? If the former, they installed one-child policy with the sole purpose of population restriction, sounds pretty "responsible" to me. If the latter, are you suggesting as a people, maybe the Chinese shouldn't breed as many, to, say, leave space for other people?

elefanten 9y ago
Yes, it's not particularly productive to factor China's large population into comparisons of current responsibility. But GP has a valid point in pointing out that it's not reasonable to compare the entirety of a rich developed country to a low-density slice of China, which is very likely using fewer resources because of scarcity and underdevelopment rather than greater than average responsibility.
aianus 9y ago
If I choose to drive 1000km that I don't have to drive in a 35mpg Prius I am not more environmentally conscious than someone who drives 200km in a 10mpg Hummer. Similarly if I have 10 kids instead of 2. Anyways, I should have said "was irresponsible" since those decisions were made by their ancestors a while back and so there's not much more they can do about it now.
- justicezyx 9y ago
  The analog is pretty unreasonable. It sounds like 1000km Prius driver has an option to drive only 200km. But they may not have. I.e. a poor lower middle class worker needs to drive everyday for work, while a millionare might choose to stay at home being environmental friendly. But he might be using too much electricity... Plus, you cannot just bash Chinese government of killing baby, while at the same time calling them environmental irresponsible...

bildung 9y ago

> I don't agree that you can just divide by population and say they're fine. CO2 output per country is not a reasonable metric. If we just split China into its provinces, does that make the problem go away? After all, each of the new countries now has a pretty small CO2 output.

philipkglass 9y ago
The sustainability of CO2 emissions is measured in terms of emissions sources divided by its emissions sinks. A ratio above 1.0 means long term increases in atmospheric and oceanic CO2. The further above 1.0 we are, the less sustainable. To make a very crude approximation, terrestrial emissions sinks scale proportionally with area. (Slightly less crude: sinks scale with forested area.) Generally speaking, countries need to have low emissions per unit area to be sustainable. Having low emissions per-capita but a high population density is no more sustainable than low population density and high emissions per-capita. China has land area of 9328246 km^2 and emitted 10641789000 tons of CO2 in 2015: that's 1141 tons/km^2/year USA has 9147590 km^2 land area and emitted 5172338000 tons CO2: 565 tons/km^2/year Canada has 9093507 km^2 land area and emitted 555401000 tons CO2: 61 tons/km^2/year EDIT: this was not intended to show China as "the worst." Belgium, for example, emits 3324 tons/km^2/year. On one hand this leads to philosophical issues of justice like "luck egalitarianism": is it fair that Canadians, by accident of birth, have so much more headroom to emit sustainably than people born to the south or east of them? (Is it fair that any nation's citizens enjoy advantages from their own country's natural resources? I tend to think "yes, it's fair enough" but people may reasonably disagree.) On the other hand, the pragmatic issue is that most countries are emitting CO2 faster than their geographic area can sink those same emissions. Certainly the largest political blocs are emitting unsustainably. The object of measuring emissions is ultimately to control them, not just to identify the party that deserves the loudest booing while we wreck the climate together. The USA, China, India, EU: none of them is "fine" and all need to make significant progress before their emissions are balanced with their sinks. (Not all of the effort needs to be on abating sources, though that's where the low hanging fruit is right now. Increasing sinking rates with afforestation, promoting soil carbon stores, and/or silicate weathering are also viable options.)
- 9y ago

groby_b 9y ago

* China: 142 people/sq mile. * Italy: 197 people/sq mile * Spain: 210 people/sq mile * Germany: 235 people/sq mile * Belgium: 343 people/sq mile * United Kingdom: 650 people/sq mile Yeah, their density compared to Western countries is truly irresponsible.