CHINA SPEWS CO2 TO FEED U.S. MARKET: EXPERTS

This is a really interesting, new idea about how to calculate emissions: not who makes them but who buys them.

Carnegie Mellon researchers call for reducing carbon emissions
June 14, 2007 (Carnegie Mellon University via PhysOrg)

WHO
Carnegie Mellon University engineering researchers Christopher L. Weber and Scott H. Matthews
click to enlarge

WHAT
The US and developed countries reduces greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by outsourcing production to developing countries like China and then object to rising emissions there.

WHEN
June 2007 issue the journal “Environmental Science and Technology”

WHERE
Carnegie Mellon University is in Pittsburgh, PA. The paper is on the reciprocal relationship between developed nations’ demand and developing nations’ GHG-spewing industry.

WHY
- A desktop computer made in China produces 3 times the GHG emissions as one made in the US.
- 1997 emissions from imports: 12% of US emissions; 2004: 22%
- With developed world demand driving the equation, the trend is not expected to change.
- The authors’ solution: The US and developed nations must control emissions not by considering where the goods that produce the emissions are made but by where they are consumed.
time to redraw the map? (click to enlarge)

QUOTES
- Mathews: “These emissions are only going to increase as the United States continues to consume more and more essential goods from outside its borders…Complicating the problem is the need to temper how we deal with emerging countries…To ask the developing countries to lower emissions too early, too abruptly will hinder their development and hamper their efforts to achieve industrialization and modernization.”
- Weber: “The central question is one of responsibility…Over the last decade, the United States’ share of global carbon emissions has gone down and China’s has gone up. However, if you count not by who makes the goods, but by who consumes the goods, the United States’ share of responsibility has stayed constant or even gone up. However, these emissions are not counted because they’ve been outsourced to other countries.”