3 ms·
China 12 billion tons CO2 and steady, USA 6 billion tons CO2 and falling. US bad, China very bad.
by engineer_22 9mo ago
China 12 billion tons CO2 and steady, USA 6 billion tons CO2 and falling.
US bad, China very bad.
- fpoling 9mo agoChina population is 4 times of US and a lot of CO2 there comes from US outsourcing energy-intensive production.
- enraged_camel 9mo agoClimate doesn't care about population or per capita metrics. The only metric that matters is CO2 PPM.
- ceejayoz 9mo agoSo all China needs to do is split in two to halve their emissions?
- enraged_camel 9mo agoWhat? My point is that people tend to turn emissions into a pissing contest about which country is emitting more, and it always becomes a debate of total emission vs. per capita, because it's ultimately a political issue. What I'm saying is that total emissions are what matter for climate change.
- Y-bar 9mo agoTotal emissions matter on a global scale. To know approximately how much each nation ought to adjust their emissions we need to look at per capita adjusted for imports/exports for products and services consumed locally but created remotely.
- ceejayoz 9mo agoYou said per capita doesn’t matter. If China split evenly into two new countries, each country’s emissions are half what China’s was. This is why per capita matters.
- wtcactus 9mo agoNo, all China has to do, is to emmit the same CO2/land mass as the USA (or better, as the EU).
- ceejayoz 9mo agoSo if they annex Mongolia and Siberia, their emissions went massively down? Nah.
- andsoitis 9mo ago> CO2/land mass as the USA I'm trying, but really struggling, to understand your logic of anchoring on land area. Can you explain why you think that's a better metric than per capita? Is it because there are climate-changing emissions that are NOT driven by humans (e.g. seasonal wildfires, volcanic eruptions, etc.)? Or is it something else?
- wtcactus 9mo agoThe amount of emissions that the planet can take (a that is the real crux of the problem) is what its ecosystems can offset. It’s very hard to calculate exactly how much the ecosystem inside a country borders can offset, but a good enough metric is its landmass. Sure, countries like Morrocos will win with this metric and countries like Brasil will lose. But in the end, it’s much better than rewarding what is actually a problem (for climate) like if it was some virtue: high birth rates.
- andsoitis 9mo agoThanks for explaining your thinking. > It’s very hard to calculate exactly how much the ecosystem inside a country borders can offset, but a good enough metric is its landmass. I think this is a flawed basis, because weather patterns, sea rise, etc. don't honor country borders. Only highly localized pollution is somewhat "constrained", but country borders are even porous to that. So I still don't know that it is an effective incentive to find a better balance. Per capita also has its problems, like penalizing less-developed countries from developing their societies, industries.
- maxglute 9mo agoClimate doesn't care about climate change, humans do. Only worthwhile metric is what geopolitics agree on, right now that's per capita emissions even though it's lenient vs historic emitters.
- engineer_22 9mo agoGreat sounds like they know how they can improve. If they halve their population they'll get it down to USA levels!
- wtcactus 9mo agoThe traditional HN solution for Climate Change: If they only had more babies in the USA, their CO2 per capita emissions would fall and we would save the planet! These 5th column arguments, are just appaling. USA (and EU, if we finally wake up and smell the coffee) don't have to pay for Asian high birthrates. If a country has the same area as another, I expect that country to stick to the same total emissions. China doesn't have to pay for it's high birthrates in the past? Well, then the West doesn't have to pay for their inovation and productivity in the past as well.
- newyankee 9mo agowhile even people born in Asian countries like me would like to go back 3-4 generations and forcefully reduce birthrates, it is not a problem as simple as it seems. By that logic Canada, Australia, NZ, and arguably even US are settled places and should not be counted. I do agree that every goalpost can be moved by drawing the boundary as you wish, but surely the fact that developed countries enjoyed a good standard of living for 100+ years and contributed more for a long time counts for something
- wtcactus 9mo ago[flagged]
- andsoitis 9mo ago> China population is 4 times of US This is a fair criticism of per capita US emissions. > a lot of CO2 there comes from US outsourcing energy-intensive production This is not a reasonable indictment of US per capita emissions. China chooses to manufacture for the US and the world. Consumption, by the US, but importantly, also the rest of the world would be less if China didn't do cheap manufacturing at scale.
- maxglute 9mo ago~15% of PRC emissions are attributed to exports. On the other hand 0% of US oil and lng exports are attributed to US emissions. Entire shale revolution is literal energy intensive production, it's just attributed to importers not exporters in accounting. In another world, emission accounting would be territorial - renewables would be credited to producer, carbon would be taxed to extractor. Reasonable framing is PRC is emitting a lot simply because it has 4x people, exports are not substantial contributor, with caveat their population is declining. US is emitting more than what accounting shows, while also adding more increasing pop with higher per capita emissions. Probably not reasonable to criticize countries for population growth, but pretty fair to point out US (and other fossil exporters) should have exports count towards emissions, conversely, PRC renewable exports should be credited. Instead they're being punished for producing the panel that saves other people emissions. For comparison US exported ~5 billion BOE / barrels of oil equivalent per year, PRC exported 0.5 BOE in solar, which translates to displacing 15 billion BOE assuming 30 year life span. In real world, PRC renewable exports is displacing 3x more emission than US fossil exports generate. That 15b BOE is larger than PRC emissions via exports, i.e. for all intents and purpose PRC export is now (substantial) net carbon sink, it's a global decarbonization utility. Meanwhile US chooses to be export fossil to the world.
- dannyfreeman 9mo agoTry per capita
- defrost 9mo agoNow do cumulative over past century, then account for US consumption of goods now produced in China.
- Keats 9mo agoand per capita?
- engineer_22 9mo agoThat's just over 10^-9 degrees Celsius per capita
- ginko 9mo agoOnly kelvin would make sense for per capita calculations with temperature.
- engineer_22 9mo agoyour right, an obvious mistake on my part, thank you for the correction :P
- neves 9mo agoThis kind of denial prevents any solution for global warming. - USA emits much more per Capita - CO2 accumulates in atmosphere, so you must account for emissions since the country industrialized - USA sent it's polluting industries to China and buy the final products The AA motto goes well: The first step is to admit you have a problem
- engineer_22 9mo agoNo denying that US CO2 emissions down 16% since 2005
- K0nserv 9mo agoYes, in part because the US outsourced a lot of their industry to China since. The US is still one of the principal per capita emitters, they need to cut emissions by two thirds to catch up with Europe and in half to reach China.
- maxglute 9mo agoNo denying US increased crude oil production from 5 to 13 million barrels per day and lng from 50 to 112 billion cubic feed per day. It just so happens PRC widget exports count as PRC emissions but US fossil exports don't count as US emissions. If they did US would be emitting roughly the same as 2005 or 30% higher, depending on if you believe industry or climate scientists. Industry claims lng is cleaner than displaced coal. Scientist claim lng leaks substantially higher than industry admits.
- boudin 9mo agoChina is doing so while western countries delegated a lot of its manufacturing to China though. The fact that US emissions are not going down shows that something is really really wrong there. Europe claiming that its emissions are going down is deceptive as taking into account its share of emission in China would paint a different picture.
- wtcactus 9mo agoSure, in the end, we must always find a way to blame western societies while we give a blank check for China (and other bad actors) to continue doing whatever they are doing... This was never about saving the planet, it was always about destroying our socio-economic system. Look how the tune changed in Brazil when Lula came into power: they never burned so much rainforest, but now it's fine, becasue socialists are in power.
- sebastianconcpt 9mo agoThe issue is never the issue. The issue is always The Revolution.
- boudin 9mo agoOops, i fed a troll or an ai
- senti_sentient 9mo agoHe’s a troll
- krthr 9mo agoper capita?
- triceratops 9mo agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45108292 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45108292 China falling actually. > USA 6 billion tons CO2 and falling You're literally commenting on an article about it increasing.
- engineer_22 9mo agook but if you just look at the trends you'll see that actually china is flat, and america is decreasing, /on trend/
- triceratops 9mo agoThe most recent trends show China is decreasing and America is increasing emissions. China is building out renewable energy and America is doing the opposite. So these trends are likely to continue. What "trends" are you talking about?