7 ms·

> 9. Global carbon emissions are not reduced, mostly because of lack of initiative by China and 3rd world countries. Ya let's blame it all on other people.

droithomme 7y ago
> let's blame it all on other people Unfortunately we can't blame it on ourselves as our carbon emissions, assuming it's even relevant, have decreased massively compared to predictions.
- haecceity 7y ago
  Companies in developed countries have been exporting emissions to developing countries. Those companies are profiting while people like you and I point fingers at each other. Pretty funny. Anyway if you look at the emission metrics per capita it's still developed countries at the top.
  - fierarul 7y ago
    ... but if developed countries are asking developing countries to reduce their emissions it means they are implicitly asking for a price raise too, no? So, why not do that?
    - haecceity 7y ago
      Not everyone can afford the price raise. Firms in developed countries would be hurt if consumption decreases due to the price raise so who’s going to support this policy?
      - fierarul 7y ago
        So could this really lead to a global depression? I doubt it.
        haecceity 7y ago
        Not saying it could. I'm just discussing the incentives involved.
- jlarocco 7y ago
  You've got to be kidding... United States per-capita CO2 emmisions are 17.5 tons per year vs China's 6.18, and that's not even taking into account the fact that China emits a lot of CO2 producing cheap products to sell to the US. https://cotap.org/per-capita-carbon-co2-emissions-by-country/ https://cotap.org/per-capita-carbon-co2-emissions-by-country...
  - azinman2 7y ago
    I’m not arguing against US CO2, but the likelihood of those numbers for China being anywhere near accurate is small.
    - onion2k 7y ago
      Likewise for the US.
      - alxlaz 7y ago
        Why? They are supported by pretty much every source out there. See e.g. EDGAR ( https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/9d09ccd1-e0dd-11e9-9c4e-01aa75ed71a1/language-en https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/9d0... ), or this slightly older data set from the World Bank: https://databank.worldbank.org/reports.aspx?source=2&series=EN.ATM.CO2E.PC&country= https://databank.worldbank.org/reports.aspx?source=2&series=... . I'm not sure why you'd expect it to be otherwise. This is a per-capita figure, and carbon emissions are strongly correlated with income and purchasing power. CO2 emissions aren't driven by consumer goods production alone. There's an adjusted metric that puts things into an even better perspective: https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-other-greenhouse-gas-emissions#consumption-based-trade-adjusted-co2-emissions https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-other-greenhouse-gas-emis... .
        azinman2 7y ago
        So that last link has numbers drastically different from the GP’s data, and it says that it comes simply from fossil fuel combustion and cement — not population. Population is also not a great metric; the types of power plants, typical personal transportation usages, and transport of everyday items like food will vary greatly. These are also all very dynamic. The reality is all these data sources will he estimates. Estimates can be severely wrong — they can be produced by local governments with incentives to lie, or estimated by outside observers with poor actual knowledge. China has had a long history of empirical lying in their economic data locally due to internal party targets, for example. I see no reason for them to give accurate numbers to the UN/external world, where as with the US there’s enough decentralization and public data that there’s a better chance of being more accurate (but still probably quite off).
mrarjen 7y ago
Also lack of initiative by many 1st world countries, hopefully there will be plenty of new technologies developed in the coming years that reduce or capture carbon. But with current developments this will be far too little too late and it will be a rough ride forward.
- akuji1993 7y ago
  A technology that helps reduce and capture carbon? You mean trees? Because we already have them for a few million years.
5bbee851bca2 7y ago
Perhaps you should look at the actual stats. Same goes for the mountains of plastic garbage circling in our oceans. ...but hey; you probably think you have "science" on your side (i.e. a screaming 16 year old girl with issues) so go on.
FabHK 7y ago
Indeed. Which one country just left the Paris Agreement? Hint: Not China or 3rd world countries.
- majewsky 7y ago
  The Paris Agreement is just a piece of paper. If we go by the "initiative" measure of GGP, the leadership of most countries doesn't display a sufficient amount of it.
- Typhon 7y ago
  The big difference between the American attitude and the Chinese attitude towards ecology is this : The Americans loudly refuse to do anything, loudly deny that there's a problem, and loudly proclaim their hatred of ecology. The Chinese say yes to everything but they have absolutely no intention of actually doing anything, they just lie. Check this out : https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/05/23/china-factories-releasing-thousands-tonnes-illegal-ozone-depleting/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/05/23/china-factories-... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/04/china-underreporting-coal-consumption-by-up-to-17-data-suggests https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/04/china-underrep...
  - brutt 7y ago
    From result standpoint, it's small difference, not a big one.
  - oefrha 7y ago
    According to Climate Action Tracker, https://climateactiontracker.org/countries/china/current-policy-projections/ https://climateactiontracker.org/countries/china/current-pol... > This means that according to our assessment, China will meet its 2020 pledge and its NDC targets, but still be above current emissions levels. China’s chief climate negotiator, Xie Zhenhua, has expressed the opinion that China could meet its 2030 peaking targets early, reflecting the conclusions of other studies (Green and Stern, 2017; Xu, Stanway and Daly, 2018; Gallagher et al., 2019b; Wang et al., 2019). CAT analysis confirms that, based on current GDP projections, China is indeed likely to meet the carbon intensity target of its 2030 pledge early. So the TL;DR is China is likely to meet its pledges but the pledges themselves are pretty weak — rated “highly insufficient” and only consistent with a 4 degrees warming limit. That’s inconsistent with your “say yes to everything but ... just lie” assessment. It appears they don’t say yes to everything (hence the weak pledge) but will hit the promised target. Your links don’t support your point either. The first link doesn’t pinpoint the cause (could be a lapse in enforcement) and the second link is about a revision in official figures; Guardian’s reporting is based on a NYT article with a more neutral tone, but even the Guardian article with its loaded title (surprise surprise) didn’t call it lying.
WhompingWindows 7y ago
He said "mostly" because of, not totally due to. Furthermore, look at US emissions...they are flat or declining over time, and will continue to slowly decline. So, we're closer to hitting our future Paris goals than China, whose emissions are going to continue to rise quickly due to increased oil use, LNG, and a LOT of coal use for at least 20 years to come.

droithomme 7y ago

> let's blame it all on other people Unfortunately we can't blame it on ourselves as our carbon emissions, assuming it's even relevant, have decreased massively compared to predictions.

haecceity 7y ago
Companies in developed countries have been exporting emissions to developing countries. Those companies are profiting while people like you and I point fingers at each other. Pretty funny. Anyway if you look at the emission metrics per capita it's still developed countries at the top.
- fierarul 7y ago
  ... but if developed countries are asking developing countries to reduce their emissions it means they are implicitly asking for a price raise too, no? So, why not do that?
  - haecceity 7y ago
    Not everyone can afford the price raise. Firms in developed countries would be hurt if consumption decreases due to the price raise so who’s going to support this policy?
    - fierarul 7y ago
      So could this really lead to a global depression? I doubt it.
      - haecceity 7y ago
        Not saying it could. I'm just discussing the incentives involved.
jlarocco 7y ago
You've got to be kidding... United States per-capita CO2 emmisions are 17.5 tons per year vs China's 6.18, and that's not even taking into account the fact that China emits a lot of CO2 producing cheap products to sell to the US. https://cotap.org/per-capita-carbon-co2-emissions-by-country/ https://cotap.org/per-capita-carbon-co2-emissions-by-country...
- azinman2 7y ago
  I’m not arguing against US CO2, but the likelihood of those numbers for China being anywhere near accurate is small.
  - onion2k 7y ago
    Likewise for the US.
    - alxlaz 7y ago
      Why? They are supported by pretty much every source out there. See e.g. EDGAR ( https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/9d09ccd1-e0dd-11e9-9c4e-01aa75ed71a1/language-en https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/9d0... ), or this slightly older data set from the World Bank: https://databank.worldbank.org/reports.aspx?source=2&series=EN.ATM.CO2E.PC&country= https://databank.worldbank.org/reports.aspx?source=2&series=... . I'm not sure why you'd expect it to be otherwise. This is a per-capita figure, and carbon emissions are strongly correlated with income and purchasing power. CO2 emissions aren't driven by consumer goods production alone. There's an adjusted metric that puts things into an even better perspective: https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-other-greenhouse-gas-emissions#consumption-based-trade-adjusted-co2-emissions https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-other-greenhouse-gas-emis... .
      - azinman2 7y ago
        So that last link has numbers drastically different from the GP’s data, and it says that it comes simply from fossil fuel combustion and cement — not population. Population is also not a great metric; the types of power plants, typical personal transportation usages, and transport of everyday items like food will vary greatly. These are also all very dynamic. The reality is all these data sources will he estimates. Estimates can be severely wrong — they can be produced by local governments with incentives to lie, or estimated by outside observers with poor actual knowledge. China has had a long history of empirical lying in their economic data locally due to internal party targets, for example. I see no reason for them to give accurate numbers to the UN/external world, where as with the US there’s enough decentralization and public data that there’s a better chance of being more accurate (but still probably quite off).

mrarjen 7y ago

Also lack of initiative by many 1st world countries, hopefully there will be plenty of new technologies developed in the coming years that reduce or capture carbon. But with current developments this will be far too little too late and it will be a rough ride forward.

akuji1993 7y ago
A technology that helps reduce and capture carbon? You mean trees? Because we already have them for a few million years.

5bbee851bca2 7y ago

Perhaps you should look at the actual stats. Same goes for the mountains of plastic garbage circling in our oceans. ...but hey; you probably think you have "science" on your side (i.e. a screaming 16 year old girl with issues) so go on.

FabHK 7y ago

Indeed. Which one country just left the Paris Agreement? Hint: Not China or 3rd world countries.

majewsky 7y ago
The Paris Agreement is just a piece of paper. If we go by the "initiative" measure of GGP, the leadership of most countries doesn't display a sufficient amount of it.
Typhon 7y ago
The big difference between the American attitude and the Chinese attitude towards ecology is this : The Americans loudly refuse to do anything, loudly deny that there's a problem, and loudly proclaim their hatred of ecology. The Chinese say yes to everything but they have absolutely no intention of actually doing anything, they just lie. Check this out : https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/05/23/china-factories-releasing-thousands-tonnes-illegal-ozone-depleting/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/05/23/china-factories-... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/04/china-underreporting-coal-consumption-by-up-to-17-data-suggests https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/04/china-underrep...
- brutt 7y ago
  From result standpoint, it's small difference, not a big one.
- oefrha 7y ago
  According to Climate Action Tracker, https://climateactiontracker.org/countries/china/current-policy-projections/ https://climateactiontracker.org/countries/china/current-pol... > This means that according to our assessment, China will meet its 2020 pledge and its NDC targets, but still be above current emissions levels. China’s chief climate negotiator, Xie Zhenhua, has expressed the opinion that China could meet its 2030 peaking targets early, reflecting the conclusions of other studies (Green and Stern, 2017; Xu, Stanway and Daly, 2018; Gallagher et al., 2019b; Wang et al., 2019). CAT analysis confirms that, based on current GDP projections, China is indeed likely to meet the carbon intensity target of its 2030 pledge early. So the TL;DR is China is likely to meet its pledges but the pledges themselves are pretty weak — rated “highly insufficient” and only consistent with a 4 degrees warming limit. That’s inconsistent with your “say yes to everything but ... just lie” assessment. It appears they don’t say yes to everything (hence the weak pledge) but will hit the promised target. Your links don’t support your point either. The first link doesn’t pinpoint the cause (could be a lapse in enforcement) and the second link is about a revision in official figures; Guardian’s reporting is based on a NYT article with a more neutral tone, but even the Guardian article with its loaded title (surprise surprise) didn’t call it lying.

WhompingWindows 7y ago

He said "mostly" because of, not totally due to. Furthermore, look at US emissions...they are flat or declining over time, and will continue to slowly decline. So, we're closer to hitting our future Paris goals than China, whose emissions are going to continue to rise quickly due to increased oil use, LNG, and a LOT of coal use for at least 20 years to come.