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As U.S. and E.U. Retreat on Climate, China Takes the Leadership Role (e360.yale.edu)
submitted 1 year ago by to c/climate@slrpnk.net
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COP30 in Belém may well be remembered as the moment that the world accepted the leading role of China in addressing humanity’s most important challenge.

but now the E.U. is beset by internal problems. Its primary industrial economy, Germany, is suffering from Chinese competition, and with the rise of right-wing parties, resistance has emerged to the ambitious climate policies of the European Commission. One symptom of these internal troubles was the E.U.’s embarrassing failure to agree its own mitigation targets before the informal deadline of September 30.

The United States, meanwhile, is trying to force its partner countries to buy more U.S. oil and gas.

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[–] 4 points 1 year ago (6 children)

We could all hope that China would lead the world in climate change as the country is the world's biggest polluter (with coal consumption still on the rise as I wrote just in another thread).

However, China's is far away of any leadership when it comes to reduce carbon emission.

The scientists from the Climate Actions Tracker call China's recent announcement to cut its greenhouse gas emissions by 7% to 10% by 2035 as 'disappointing' as China - given the country's size and economy - would need to cut emissions by around 30% for the world to be on track to the Paris goal.

According to the scientists, no country is on track to Paris, but while the EU and Brazil's climate actions are insufficient, China and India's are considered highly insufficient.

So it doesn't look like leadership.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    It seems unfair to compare the pollution per capita of an industrial economy that is exporting lots of industrial goods with that of the service economy that is importing most of those industrial goods. To compare a region that is exporting solar panels to be with a region that is importing them.

    There are undoubtedly corrections you can make to fairly compare China and Europe, and I don't know for sure if China is more green by those standards. But you're definitely not saying something meaningful.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (1 child)

    @Tiresia@slrpnk.net

    I wrote that recently in another thread, and it's true also here.

    Your view is oversimplified to a degree that it is outright false.

    However, it is not necessary to engage in such a discussion as it is not relevant here when we look at the data and how it is calculated.

    According to the scientists at the Climate Action Tracker (CAT) cited in the linked report, China is behind by any metric, including by what the CAT scientists call a country's "fair share." This reflects the “common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, in the light of different national circumstances”, as stated in the Paris agreement (Article 4.3),

    Here you can find China's CAT rating. As you can see, China's 'policy and actions against fair share' is rated as insufficient, with its overall rating highly insufficient.

    As you can also see in the CAT rating, no country is on track, but China is among those countries most behind by any comparative standards.

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  • [–] 0 points 8 months ago

    Looking at how they calculate the CAT fair share, they do not address my critique that it's unfair that if someone buys a polluting product, only the producer is held responsible. This "fair share" score still unfairly gives economies that export services and import goods a free pass.

    I trust those scientists to have gotten an accurate measurement of their working definition of fairness, but I have no reason to trust the procedure that gave them that working definition.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago

    It seems unfair to compare the pollution per capita of an industrial economy that is exporting lots of industrial goods with that of the service economy that is importing most of those industrial goods.

    Yes and no. First of all it's not like the EU doesn't have industry, secondly, China is choosing to profit from industrial export, nobody's forcing them, it's a deliberate action to pollute in exchange for economic benefit.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Would Europe and North America stop buying from China and Brazil because of emissions? I bet not. It's not just China's and Brazil's responsability because a huge share of their emissions are to meet demand of the exports to Europe and North America.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago

    I don't think the other counteies are exactly forcing China and India to produce those items. They do and want to do it very low cost and that's where the issues come from. China and India want to benefit from the demand and at that point you'll have to admit to a responsibility in the situation.

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