Matt Yglesias

37 Responses to “China Pollution Cloud”

1. Petey Says:
   November 13th, 2008 at 12:16 pm

   “I’m pretty sure that any article that involves something “blotting out the sun” is bad news.”

   Not for Montgomery Burns.

2. Susan Says:
   November 13th, 2008 at 12:18 pm

   Eh, we’ll all be dead of kidney failure before this becomes a serious problem.

3. blah Says:
   November 13th, 2008 at 12:19 pm

   Melamine only kills pets and babies. The rest of us will just have to get used to kidney stones.

4. gordon gekko Says:
   November 13th, 2008 at 12:34 pm

   Then why not use our CO2 emissions as a bargaining tool to pursued them to reduce theirs. It seems rather odd that America (and the west) should unilaterally cut emissions and then hope China will for some reason follow us. If the choice is between multilateral binding targets and zero CO2 reductions, the right binding targets make a lot more sense. But if the choice is simply between lowering your own emissions and not, there is much less of an incentive for action and a much greater cost.

5. godoggo Says:
   November 13th, 2008 at 12:40 pm

   How long before the “One minute you complain about global warming; now you’re complaining about not enough sunlight” meme gets started on the right?

6. gordon gekko Says:
   November 13th, 2008 at 12:42 pm

   Since China is a heavy coal consumer I would assume most of that pollution is sulphur dioxide. The sulphate aerosols counter much of the warming effect of global warming by reflecting sunlight in the stratosphere. It may cause acid rain and smog but it’s not as bad as simply omitting CO2 (at least with regard to global warming).

7. cdunc Says:
   November 13th, 2008 at 12:59 pm

   Not to be too contrarian here, but isn’t it a bit rich of us (the U.S.) to wag a finger at China regarding their emissions, when our per capita carbon emissions are five times theirs (U.S. emissions = 5.5 metric tons of carbon per person per year; China = 1.1, according to the Federal government’s Energy Information Administration at http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/tableh1c.xls).

   It’s a bit like a table of gluttonous feasters saying “Whoa, slow down there!” to a table of sandwich eaters over at the other side of the cafeteria — a table of sandwich eaters who are now starting to be able to afford larger lunchs (e.g. not just a sandwich but now sandwich and chips). Meanwhile the gluttonous eaters are patting themselves on the back from contemplating cutting back from a lunch of steak+potato+bread+cheesecake+soda to steak+potato+bread+cheesecake.

   On the contrary: Doesn’t elementary fairness suggest that ideally, we need to determine how many metric tons of global carbon emissions per year is a safe level, then translate this into a safe per capita emission rates at current world population, and then give each country a fixed quota based on their population x the safe per capita rate? Rich countries that didn’t want to make such drastic cuts in their lifestyles could (via emissions trading) purchase carbon emission permits from developing countries that are under their quota, and thus have some to sell.

   I don’t really like this proposal — it would be painful. But it seems to me the only fair way to go about addressing the problem of global warming. The alternative is to tell China, India, etc., that by right we are entitled to a higher level of per capita emissions than they are. That doesn’t seem plausible to me — at least, it does not seem plausible to me when I am thinking impartially (and doesn’t morality require us to think impartially?)

   Yes, yes, politically this proposal is not going to happen. I know that. But isn’t that just to say that politically, a fair solution is not going to happen?

   Just askin’.

8. Woody Tanaka Says:
   November 13th, 2008 at 1:19 pm

   “China’s rapid economic growth has been one of the great feel-good stories of the past 15-20 years”

   To whom??? They are an imperialistic and autocratic government which respects neither its own citizens’ human rights nor its environment. All this “rapid economic growth” has done is made this government stronger. I say that it has been one of the great tragedies of the past 15-20 years.

9. Leee Says:
   November 13th, 2008 at 1:22 pm

   Coal is one of the most carbon-rich fossil fuels in use and the largest emitter of CO2. (Sulfur makes up a small part of coal’s composition.)

   at this point they really do seem to be pushing the limits of what the planet can handle.

   Pendantry: the planet, as a biosphere, can handle a lot. Mass extinctions are a part of terrestrial history, and life has always bounced back. This side of a The Road-style apocalypse, human-style environmental devastation would merely pave the way for a new breed of super-roaches to take over. What’s happening now due to anthropogenic climate change, though, is that certain societies and ways of living are going to be wiped out.

10. Rich in PA Says:
    November 13th, 2008 at 1:31 pm

    Damn you, Petey! My best-laid plans, thwarted by you and your precocious posting.

11. cdunc Says:
    November 13th, 2008 at 2:13 pm

    DTM,

    Interesting idea (creating a carbon emission per unit GDP rate instead of a carbon emission per capita rate).

    One follow-up thought. The per-capita idea would work something like this. Suppose the sake of argument we decide the planet can handle 6.9 billion metric tons of carbon emissions per year. That works out to be 1 metric ton per capita of safe emissions annually, at current world population (6.9 billion). China, at 1.1 billion people, would thus be granted (by the proposal) 1.1 billion metric tons of total annual emissions for their whole country (1.1 billion Chinese people time 1 metric ton of carbon emissions per person annually). This would be a locked-in rate, so that next year China would get the same quota of 1.1 billion metric tons allowance, then the following year
    China would get the same 1.1 billion metric tons, etc. Hence, if China’s population increases, they will have to lower their per capita emissions rate (e.g. if their population goes up to 1.6 billion, say, then they will have to lower their per capita emissions to 0.625 tons — i.e., 1.1 billion tons of emissions divided by 1.6 billion people). So this proposal will in effect give countries incentive to curb their population.

    What about the alternative proposal of creating an emissions limit of X tons of carbon per unit GDP? Hmmm… I will have to think about that more. A couple of initial musings follow.

    First, consider an analogy: rural village X and big city Y both use the same landfill. Engineers decide that the landfill can only handle safely 1000 tons of waste per year. Is it really fair for those engineers to determine X and Y’s yearly allowance of waste based on the size of their economies, e.g. so that if city-dwellers earn twice the average income of village-dwellers, then city-dwellers’ per person landfill allowance will be twice that of villagers? How would you explain this to villagers? (”Well, you see, city-folk are rich, so they deserve twice your waste allowance.”)

    Second, the emissions rate per unit GDP will have to be recalculated each year, since if it is held constant, as world GDP goes up so would total global emissions, surpassing the safe total rate. So each year the allowable emissions rate per unit GDP will have to be lowered (except god forbid in the case of a global recession in which world GDP shrinks). But this in turn means that each country will look on other countries’ growing GDPs with alarm, since other countries’ growth this year can be counted on to lower YOUR country’s allowable emissions next year. This will heighten conflicts of interest between countries. That’s not a fatal objection to the proposal, but it is one downside, perhaps. (One could propose locking in per country allowances for all time based on this year’s GDP data, as I proposed with population above. But this is just to lock in rich countries’ advantages in wealth for all time, which exacerbates the unfairness worry I mentioned a moment ago via the city/village analogy.)

12. cdunc Says:
    November 13th, 2008 at 3:53 pm

    Interesting reflections, DTM. Thanks for the response.

    As I said in my previous post, I’ll have to think about this more.

    I guess I am still having a bit of trouble thinking that what matters above all is how dirty vs how clean your country’s technology is, as opposed to how much dirt (i.e. CO2) is produced by your average citizen.

    At the risk of overworking the city/village analogy, suppose city dwellers use high tech production methods that produce much less waste per unit production, and villagers use low-tech productions methods that produce much more waste per unit production. Then under your proposal, if I understand correctly, villagers would have to buy permits from the city dwellers in order to be allowed to use their less efficient (i.e. less clean) technology, right? (Supposing, that is, that the low-tech production methods the villagers use are dirty enough to be over the allowable waste-per-unit-production ratio.) And this could be the case even though each villager is on average putting, say, 1/5 the waste into the landfill as each city-dweller puts there, because although the city-dweller has more efficient technology, he/she uses it to produce and consume many more goods total than the villager does.

    Obviously the analogy here is waste = CO2 and landfill = atmosphere. To put the point in carbon terms, using a model that is very simplified for comprehension purposes: if I drive a hybrid car 30,000 miles a year and you drive a tractor 3 miles a year, I produce more waste total even though I use cleaner technology. Now suppose that my behavior and your behavior is typical of our compatriots, i.e. I live in a country of long-distance hybrid drivers and you live in a country of short-distance tractor drivers. Should your country of short-distance tractor-drivers really have to buy carbon intensity permits from my country of long-distance hybrid-drivers in order to go about your tractor driving? Even though your tractors emit much less CO2 per capita than my hybrid-drivers? I still have some fairness reservations about that!

    But maybe I’m not fully grasping the plan. And in any case I suspect you’re on to something important. Perhaps the fairest proposal would be some sort of mix of per-capita allowances and carbon-intensity allowances? It’s hard for me to say what that might be, however, given my crude level of current understanding.

    BTW, I’m curious, do you have any recommended reading outlining in more detail a carbon intensity (i.e. emissions per unit GDP) approach to country allowances? (FWIW, my own per capita proposal is based on Peter Singer’s chapter 2, “One Atmosphere,” in his book *One World: The Ethics of Globalization*.)

    Thanks again!

13. DMonteith Says:
    November 13th, 2008 at 4:15 pm

    “They” are having trouble in that they are producing all of our crap for us. Our clear skies and cheap sneakers are a large part of China’s smog.

14. cdunc Says:
    November 13th, 2008 at 10:33 pm

    DTM,

    Very little time… so just a quick follow-up…

    I’m a bit puzzled why you think the per capita approach would have to sacrifice environmental goals. Both approaches take a total cap (in my earlier examples, 6.9 billion metric tons of carbon emissions globally per year). Then both approaches use this total cap to compute a rate — a carbon emissions per capita rate, or a carbon emissions per unit GDP rate. If each approach is followed, global carbon emissions are the same, no?

    Secondly, even on the per capita approach, if a developing country (say, India) sells carbon emission permits, then that will give it incentive to adopt clean technology. Adopting dirty technology will mean using up some of its carbon allowance, thereby forfeiting the revenue it might have had from selling the permits. So there is incentive to adopt clean technology. (Of course, much here depends on correctly pricing the permits, which I’ll admit can get tricky…)

15. Marc Says:
    November 14th, 2008 at 11:18 am

    Carbon emissions have strong negative external consequences, so the solution is rather clearly to invest in alternatives that lack those negative consequences. The alternative may be very harmful to a vast number of people, including those in the developing countries. China has coastal cities too.

    People here are also not thinking through the problem with things like soot: they get removed from the atmosphere quickly while the CO2 stays for a very long time. If you clean up the factory emission the soot is gone in a few years; the CO2 can stay in the air for a millenium. So you cannot balance one with the other in any sustainable fashion – and the human health cost from pollution is also enormous.

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