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anc84

We should have embargos on the US for pursuing a climate change program that destroys the planet.

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I wish we could, but I'm afraid the international military projection of the US would make this impossible to enforce.

Do you also advocate for an embargo of China, which pollutes at over twice the rate of the US?

How about embargo of the EU, which currently pollutes at roughly the same rate?

Did you know that energy production in the US is overall more environmentally friendly than in Germany, for example?

The US has one of the highest CO2 per capita of the OECD. Germany emits half the CO2 per capita that the US does.

Also, Chinese people don’t drive stupid big SUV and trucks while running the AC on full blast all summer.

The US emits more CO2 while Europe releases far more NOx and other more “traditional” pollutants.

The diesel emissions scandal in the US had a European counterpart that was never dealt with. 2018 models are still polluting far above the official limits which themselves are more lax than the US. [1]

[1] https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/09/180921140151.h...

The effect of those "other more “traditional” pollutants" is mostly local, whereas global warming and ocean acidification are global.

Ocean acidification is a global problem. NOx smog may seem local but it has large scale effects.

Ocean acidification is a consequence of the massive CO2 emissions. CO2 is an acid.

I’ve been in plenty of stupid big SUV’s with air conditioning blasting in the summer while in China. Big SUV’s are a status symbol and China summers are horrendously hot.

That being said I’m much more concerned with trash burning (it still happens, I’ve seen it plenty when driving outside of cities) and the byproducts of the intense construction that can’t be slowed down without seriously hurting their economy. I know multiple Chinese people with their retirement investments in concrete manufacturing companies that are losing big with recent government clamping down on that.

Both of these are anecdotal, sure, but then again I don’t trust official Chinese government data so anecdotal has some value.

The USA and other developed countries went through their own periods of abusing the environment during their industrial revolutions so I have to assume China will get through this as well. Things are already improving. And at least their government acknowledges it’s something they need to improve rather than actively regressing like the USA.

So place an embargo on the US because people want to buy big cars? That seems smart.

Per capita CO2 emissions are much worse in the US than China. China also has CO2 reduction policies and a massive drive to adopt modern generating technology.

The US is often singled out because of a dogmatic refusal to accept reality, and policies that actively increase emissions.

Actually, per capita, the US is worse

Time to get up

Yeah, except that the US has reduced emissions more than any other country and is highly competitive on a per-capita percentage basis.

Numbers, please.

Also, starting from the US emissions per capita, it's really not hard to reduce it.

If you mean with competitive that the US is among the countries with the highest per capita emissions then you are right.

you just gonna throw this out or will you back up your claims by some sources? because looking here[0] tells a very different story. while there has been a reduction since 1980, it has not been "more than any other country". and crucially, per capita emissions are pretty bad in the US.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_di...

I found this: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/07/16/chart-of-the-week-the...

Which agrees in total tons. I didn't find anything per capita, or relative to current emissions.

Anyway measuring emissions this way is pointless when the production is simply offshored to other countries.

According to Carbon Brief traded goods are 22% of emissions. 78% isn't "pointless" and there are things that can't be offshored like driving to work, running your fridge or heating your building.

That said, I agree with the trade system accounting for CO2 emissions.

https://www.carbonbrief.org/mapped-worlds-largest-co2-import...

> Yeah, except that the US has reduced emissions more than any other country

Starting from insanely high emission levels

> and is highly competitive on a per-capita percentage basis.

No. That's just false.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_di...

???

Your link says in 2013 the U.S. was near its neighbor Canada on per capita carbon emissions.

That's still double the EU. But that's also 6 years ago; the gap will have closed somewhat.

And Canada reflects the emission levels of rich Americans. Canada is no roll model on carbon emission.

Canada is a huge frozen country most of the year. Comparing warmer countries to Canada doesn't make sense emission wise.

Does currently, but that's climate shift for you.

Yeah but look at our totals. It’s very low. Per capita it is bad. We are wasteful and an oil producing country but our population is spread out and we have a colder climate. Check out the breakdown and you’ll see transportation is the offender.

Canada is not at all spherical...

Read the central table, the data is from 2015. Every metrics shows the US is worse: total, per capita, per GDP. (The last two shows the US is more than twice as much polluting. I doubt thé US cut it's emmision by more than half since 2015. Other country are also not standing still. Germany vowed to cut off coal entirely in the next decades.)

Alright, central table.

So is @anc84 advocating for the embargo of Australia too, whose 2015 pollution is even higher than the United States?

Not true. The US is responsible for 14% of emissions, which is unconscionable for a country that only holds ~4.5% of the world's population. You're actually doing quite horribly on a per-capita basis. China is doing far better than the US on a per-capita count.

Should be GDP per unit of carbon. Not people.

Why? Are some people allowed to pollute more or less depending on if they are rich or poor?

More productive people are allowed to pollute more because they create more good for the world like cures for cancer and the internet and machine learning.

That is solely because 1/3 of China's population is still living extremely impoverished lives that are equivalent to third world standards. They have 400-500 million people that are still among the poorest on earth. I can't imagine how you think that's an accomplishment that deserves recognition. Their low per capita pollution output due to extreme poverty, is not due to stellar environmental policies by China.

I just want to point out that, as of 2012, there was only 6.5% of the population in China living in poverty according to World Bank.

http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/china/overview#3

This is only true in absolute numbers, because the US started so much higher than the rest of the world.

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.ATM.CO2E.PC?location...

Even though it started lower, Europe has been reducing its emissions at a faster rate. In 2014, Europe was at 63% of its peak of emissions, whereas the US were at 72%.

The slope in log scale gives it away too (from the same data set, comparing US (orange) and Eurozone (blue) since 1971): https://i.imgur.com/099XLIw.png

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