[HN Gopher] Handful of cities driving urban greenhouse gas emiss...
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Handful of cities driving urban greenhouse gas emissions
Author : ilamont
Score : 52 points
Date : 2021-08-09 16:39 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.reuters.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.reuters.com)
| lbriner wrote:
| It is easy to feel powerless because "everyone else" is making it
| so much worse than me, why bother, but I prefer the adage "Don't
| curse the darkness, light a candle".
|
| There are obvious reasons why massive economies won't just
| replace factories etc. with cleaner tech so instead, those of us
| who really care should be developing the tech that drives this.
| Invent an amazing wind turbine or clean battery and let the
| Chinese and whoever else buy it up to clean up their country!
|
| This isn't just for pollution though. If you think that you can
| do policing/government/privacy/transport/whatever better then do
| it and let all the other countries copy you :-)
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| Unsurprisingly, 23 out of 25 are in China.
|
| When you look at who's polluting and who's emissions are on an
| upward trajectory, there's one obvious country that's actively
| working against the environment. China's emissions aren't slowing
| down. Coal is incredibly cheap when there's no carbon tax or
| emission standards. One of the many reasons it's cheaper to
| manufacture in China and why North Americans and Europeans can't
| compete [0]. Comparing the US[1] and China[2], the US has:
|
| - Decreasing per capita emissions in the US starting in 1973
| (-27%)
|
| - A decrease in the countries emission starting in 2007 (-13%)
|
| Meanwhile for the same period China has had
|
| - a 7x increase per capita since 1973 (+532%)
|
| - 48% increase for its global emissions since 2007
|
| So it is possible to drastically reduce our carbon footprint
| thanks to innovation and smarter power generation.
|
| Time to add tariffs on goods produced by states who made the
| decision of going all-in on polluting power generation, and
| potentially apply immigration quotas to citizens of these
| countries.
|
| [0] https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/26/us-leads-greenhouse-gas-
| emis...
|
| [1] https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/united-states
|
| [2] https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china
| notJim wrote:
| If you want to play this fairness game, I don't think it comes
| out in the US's favor. The US alone has emitted 25% of the
| cumulative emissions up till this point, far beyond its share
| of population. Why is it China's job to sacrifice for the sake
| of our mess? Why did we get a 100-year head-start using cheap
| fossil fuels to develop our country and they don't?
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/contributed-most-global-co2
|
| My point is, playing this blame game is not helping anything.
| It's a global problem, so we all have to contribute. The
| atmosphere does not know or care about national boundaries, so
| we need to do as much as possible. The fact is, America has
| high emissions per capita, and the resources and know-how to
| fix it.
| Server6 wrote:
| This is because the west has outsourced our manufacturing and
| therefore our emissions to China. We're all responsible for it,
| so don't just blame "the other". The world needs to reduce its
| emissions. A big part of this is putting pressure on China to
| act, and if they don't we need to think about moving
| manufacturing out of China to countries more willing to make
| green concessions.
| relativ575 wrote:
| It takes two to tango. The west was happy to hand over
| manufacturing to China, but only because the China was even
| happier to take it - [0].
|
| Prosperity comes with responsibility. China has been the
| largest automobile market since 2009, with annual grow rate
| 45%. Almost 1 in 3 vehicles sold in 2020 is in China. The
| majority of them are personal vehicles.
|
| You're right though that there are really no "others" here to
| blame. We will be doomed if we can't fight pollution and
| climate change collectively.
|
| [0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_economic_zones_of
| _Chin...
| throw0101a wrote:
| > _This is because the west has outsourced our manufacturing
| and therefore our emissions to China._
|
| For the US at least, there has not been a major drop in
| production-based emissions in the last thirty years:
|
| * https://twitter.com/Noahpinion/status/1424038327905230850
| [deleted]
| topspin wrote:
| "putting pressure on China to act, and if they don't we need
| to think about moving manufacturing out of China"
|
| None of this is feasible. The inevitable cries of imperialism
| and sinophobia and nativism ensures such policies are dead on
| arrival. Instead we will simply inculcate the necessary
| cognitive dissonance to overlook this and other unfortunate
| realities (Chinese rivers being the source of most ocean
| plastics, banned CFCs still widely used by Chinese
| manufacturers, etc.) and continue muddling along with the
| smoke stacks neatly hidden on the opposite side of the planet
| while chanting "we're the consumers!" That the blame is
| ascribed to the optimal criminal is sufficient and delivers
| all the solution required.
| nostromo wrote:
| This is false. 90% of China's co2 emissions are for local
| consumption, not manufacturing.
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china
| sudosysgen wrote:
| Is that so? Your source doesn't show which percentage of
| energy is used for foreign production or to support foreign
| production
| nostromo wrote:
| It does. Reference "Consumption-based accounting: how do
| emissions compare when we adjust for trade?"
| sudosysgen wrote:
| No, it doesn't. It accounts only for trade in emissions
| related to fossil fuels and cement use.
|
| It doesn't account for all of the supporting emissions
| needed to power a factory, just the cement needed to
| build that factory and the electricity needed to run it.
| The emissions for the infrastructure and transport aren't
| accounted properly.
|
| There is as of yet no solid data for this.
| nostromo wrote:
| We can't have a productive conversation if you're not
| going to bother to read and understand the source.
|
| > Whilst China is a large CO2 emissions exporter, it is
| no longer a large emitter because it produces goods for
| the rest of the world. This was the case in the past, but
| today, even adjusted for trade, China now has a per
| capita footprint higher than the global average (which is
| 4.8 tonnes per capita in 2017).
| wombatmobile wrote:
| If you are referring to the chart titled China:
| Consumption-based accounting, that chart doesn't account
| for C02 attributable to the products Chinese manufacturers
| export.
|
| It merely adjusts Chinese domestic C02 emissions by adding
| imported emissions that are encapsulated in imported goods.
|
| The term "Consumption" as used for the chart does not mean
| Chinese domestic consumption, but rather describes all C02
| emitted domestically, including in the manufacturing of
| goods destined for export.
| nostromo wrote:
| Wrong. It does. Read the description, or their longer
| description here:
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/consumption-based-co2
|
| > To calculate consumption-based emissions we need to
| track which goods are traded across the world, and
| whenever a good was imported we need to include all CO2
| emissions that were emitted in the production of that
| good, and vice versa to subtract all CO2 emissions that
| were emitted in the production of goods that were
| exported.
| vkou wrote:
| China also grew its GDP/capita ~100 times, and lifted ~800
| million people out of poverty in that time period.
|
| The reality is that an urban person in China produces ~as many
| emissions as an urban person anywhere in the developed world,
| and has a ~similar material quality of life, in terms of goods
| consumed. They get paid less than their Western counterpart,
| but not by that much. These days, the median salary in Shanghai
| is ~$45,000. The median salary in Paris is ~$65,000.
|
| This isn't the 90s, the wage gap is not that large anymore.
| jjeaff wrote:
| What does a rural Chinese citizen make compared to their
| rural western counterpart?
| vkou wrote:
| Next to nothing. Rural China is still a developing country.
| Urban China is a developed one.
|
| It's worth noting that more people live in Urban China than
| in the entirety of the United States. (Again, a stark
| contrast to the 70s.)
| Permit wrote:
| > - Decreasing per capita emissions in the US starting in 1973
| (-27%)
|
| > - A decrease in the countries emission starting in- 2007
| (-13%)
|
| > Meanwhile for the same period China has had
|
| > - a 7x increase per capita since 1973 (+532%)
|
| > - 48% increase for its global emissions since 2007
|
| I can't help but read this and feel that you're deliberately
| leaving out the per-capita emissions of Americans vs. Chinese
| in favor of relative changes from 1973.
|
| China emits 8.12 tons of CO2 per-person[1].
|
| The US emits 15.52 tons of CO2 per-person[2].
|
| The US is the "unfair" emitter here. That said, the true "fair"
| emissions that an individual can have would be roughly 1.61
| tons.
|
| [1] https://knoema.com/atlas/China/CO2-emissions-per-capita
|
| [2] https://knoema.com/atlas/United-States-of-
| America/CO2-emissi...
| rory wrote:
| The overall China number is a little funky because they still
| have 500M people in the countryside emitting very little.
|
| On a per capita basis, many Chinese metros are among the
| worst, as is much of the US (especially in the midwest and
| south), Canada, and Australia.
| yaacov wrote:
| What do immigration quotas have to do with anything? I think
| you're just using this climate thing as an excuse for nativism.
| wombatmobile wrote:
| If 70% of the emissions from Chinese manufacturers are
| attributable to the manufacture of products that are exported
| to consumers in America and Europe, who would you say is
| responsible for greenhouse gases - the Chinese manufacturers,
| or the American and European consumers?
|
| If your new tariffs caused Chinese manufactured goods to become
| less competitive, and resulted in the reversal of offshoring
| and the rebirth of American and European manufacturing, what
| would your tariffs have achieved?
| jjeaff wrote:
| The Chinese manufacturers. They are the ones responsible for
| their pollution. And the Chinese government who allows it.
|
| Just like drink manufacturers should be responsible for the
| plastic waste they produce.
| elliekelly wrote:
| So by that logic I could advertise coffee beans as
| handpicked by child slaves and you could buy my product
| completely guilt-free? I don't think it's functionally any
| different from arguing you aren't a murderer simply because
| you've hired a hit man. Maybe you didn't directly do the
| bad thing but you've paid someone to do the bad thing on
| you behalf. At a certain point isn't financially supporting
| the bad-actor tantamount to supporting the bad action?
| tshaddox wrote:
| > what would your tariffs have achieved?
|
| Reducing emissions, presumably. Wasn't that the point?
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| Fortunately, China's CO2 emissions haven't increased much - and
| possibly started to decrease - in the last 2 years.
|
| A hugely disproportionate amount of China's CO2 emissions
| (compared to the West) has been in construction [1].
|
| China has built a mind-bogglingly insane amount of housing in
| the last 30 years - and given its population growth - it will
| not need to continue emitting CO2 for construction at this
| rate.
|
| China's second biggest source of emissions is Coal. This is
| becoming rapidly uneconomical in China. And unlike in the US,
| it doesn't seem like the special coal interests are given much
| consideration. This source of carbon will likely be 90% gone
| within 20 years.
|
| Finally - China does not have much oil, and seems to have very
| little interest in importing massive amounts of oil for cars.
| China is RAPIDLY moving to electric vehicles. And already,
| China uses much less CO2 per capita on transport than the West.
|
| If China is going to be a long-term problem on emissions - it's
| only because 22% of the world's population lives in China - and
| China is no longer poor. It's not going to be because Chinese
| people insist on driving gas powered vehicles everywhere and
| eating bacon 24/7.
|
| [1] https://chinapower.csis.org/china-greenhouse-gas-emissions/
| analyst74 wrote:
| Exactly, gp's argument is quite sinister by choosing a
| timeframe from 1970s till now. US started cutting emission in
| 1970s, while China only started developing from an extremely
| impoverished, pre-industrial state that can barely feed its
| citizens.
|
| And despite standards of living in China still much lower
| than western countries, you can already see the reduction in
| per-capita emission since 2013, thanks to all the measures
| you mentioned.
| bellyfullofbac wrote:
| Aren't we as consumers in the West still addicted to cheap
| goods that this idealistic/extremist idea (immigration bans?!)
| will sadly not fly with the average consumer? And Tim Apple,
| etc, will just lobby the government to not implement your
| tariffs so those "2 years and they're junk" Airpods don't get
| more expensive...
| yongjik wrote:
| China's GDP per capita in 1973 was $157, which was lower than
| North Korea. Of course, any country rising from such abject
| poverty will see drastic increase in energy usage.
|
| I'm not saying we should give China a free pass, but I believe
| the correct path is for the West (or whatever country you're
| in) to take initiative and reduce CO2, while using that as a
| leverage to pressure other nations. Too many arguments end up
| sounding like "Why should I do anything when $(country X) isn't
| doing its share?" I believe that's not productive.
|
| * Also, what's up with immigration quotas? You don't want more
| people to live in a society with more efficient energy usage
| (by your own admission)?
| rory wrote:
| This image seems to tell the story best:
|
| https://www.frontiersin.org/files/Articles/696381/frsc-03-69...
|
| The per capita numbers in China are already big, but the
| biggest difference seems to be that there are a _lot_ of people
| in those Chinese cities.
|
| Sidenote, looks like the study authors think Quebec City is in
| a developing country? Ouch.
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| > Sidenote, looks like the study authors think Quebec City is
| in a developing country? Ouch.
|
| I laughed.
| tshaddox wrote:
| If China's less strict emissions regulations are a significant
| subsidy on Chinese manufacturing exports, doesn't that mean
| that the countries who establish stricter emissions regulations
| and import heavily from China are effectively just moving their
| emissions to China? It doesn't seem like breaking down
| emissions by country is particularly meaningful in cases like
| this.
| jeroenhd wrote:
| Yet even with all that cheap coal power, Chinese emissions per
| capita are much lower than those of the USA, Canada or
| Australia.
|
| If course the majority of these cities are in China, they're
| some of the most densely populated areas on the planet, located
| in a country that is still developing its economy.
|
| It's true that the rise of new and old economies such as those
| of China or India are bad for the environment as billions of
| people reach the same levels of wealth, luxury and emissions
| the West has enjoyed for decades, but as the richest economies
| in the world, the Western bloc should really be at the
| forefront of green energy and pollution reduction. Yet today
| these countries still stand out at the top of the charts,
| together with (other) oil economies.
|
| China hasn't stood still either in the past few years, and
| despite its measures to combat smog and power shortages, will
| probably see an increase in emissions as more people get access
| to more technology.
|
| China clearly doesn't have the environment in mind, but neither
| does the US. You paint a picture of the US improving massively
| while China worsens, but neither country really cares about
| their emissions. If anything, the Trump administration was
| proof that (nearly) the majority of America doesn't want to
| reduce carbon emissions.
|
| Until China reaches the CO2 emissions per capita of the US, I
| don't think any comparison between the two is fair. Whether
| that's because of infinite growth on the Chinese side of the
| equation or because of long overdue carbon emission cuts from
| the American side doesn't matter.
| wombatmobile wrote:
| For Some In China's Middle Class, Pollution Is Spurring
| Action
|
| https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2017/03/02/518173670/.
| ..
| wombatmobile wrote:
| How China is driving global green shift in electric power
| sector
|
| https://reneweconomy.com.au/china-driving-global-green-shift...
|
| The question arises: which country (or countries) has been
| driving this global green shift in electric power generation?
| The answer is clear as soon as we look at the comparable charts
| for China. We carried these charts in the earlier blog posting,
| but reproduce them here for ease of comparison.
|
| Chart 3 reveals that the proportion of China's electric power
| capacity sourced from WWS rose from 20% in 2007 to 35% in 2017
| (1H) - or a 15% swing in a decade.
|
| And the shift is of exactly the same form as the global shift
| revealed in the IEA data, making it an inescapable conclusion
| that China is the driver of the world trend.
| renewiltord wrote:
| Considering our primary assignment of value is not total carbon
| dumped but net change in carbon, the logical thing for any
| developing economy to do is to outrace all others in burning
| large amounts of fossil fuels and then cutting some percentage
| of them after some chosen threshold.
|
| Since we don't care about area under the curve, or the current
| y axis value, but only slope, I would optimize for dumping
| mondo CO2 for the next 25 years and then spend the remainder of
| humanity's time lecturing everyone else on why they haven't cut
| as much as me.
| rmah wrote:
| How can we trust that study given that it was produced in China
| and in affiliation with a Chinese provincial government? /s
| revolvingocelot wrote:
| I see the "/s", but the parent has a stealth point: presumably
| these emissions data are padded to look better (ie, less
| polluting) than they actually are. If VW could do it, China
| certainly could.
|
| ...I see happy downvotes, but I don't really see why. Don't we
| have very very recent evidence of Chinese provincial
| governments fucking around with official numbers in the form of
| 2019-2020 COVID stats? Don't we have recent evidence of Chinese
| interests ignoring agreed-upon international standards in the
| form of CFC emissions of the sort that everybody else managed
| to get out of their economic systems 30 years ago?
| neonate wrote:
| https://archive.is/djeab
| antisthenes wrote:
| Cities are still far and away most efficient form of
| living/housing as far as emissions per capita go, compared to
| suburban sprawl or even townhouse-style settlements.
|
| How do these emissions look when normalized by density and
| economic output? Is there industry within city limits? Is it
| really a mystery that the largest cities in the world are also
| responsible for the largest emission outputs?
|
| Because this honestly sounds like a non-story by a journalist
| that doesn't understand per capita terms.
|
| Yes, we still haven't decoupled economic output from emissions.
|
| Yes, we need to tackle it.
|
| What's the proposed solution here? Not having cities?
|
| Really thought Reuters would have some editors or standards,
| rather than publishing sensationalist nothingburgers like this.
| pinewurst wrote:
| How long before (study co-author) Shaoqing Chen disappears?
| redleggedfrog wrote:
| Who?
| clairity wrote:
| the title is a bit misleading:
|
| > "23 Chinese cities - among them Shanghai, Beijing and Handan -
| along with Moscow and Tokyo accounted for 52% of the total
| [greenhouse gas emissions]"
|
| but admits that
|
| > "In per capita terms, however, emissions from cities in the
| richest parts of the world are still generally higher than those
| from urban centres in developing countries..."
|
| not only could you draw the mistaken conclusion that cities are
| pollution machines, but that china is the problem child, a
| double-whammy of subtle sensationalism.
|
| the west, and the US in particular, should be leading the fight
| against pollution, not just because it's the right thing to do
| for ourselves and future generations, but also because it's a
| geopolitical and economic lever. instead, our collective
| complacency and greed drives us to subtly blame developing
| countries stiving for parity with the west, rather than tackling
| the problem with economic might and wild abandon. instead it's
| another notch in the belt for capital misallocation.
| finiteseries wrote:
| The only number that matters to the environment is the total.
|
| Every single western city could drop to 0 emissions, but those
| 23 Chinese cities along with Moscow and Tokyo already account
| for the majority of urban greenhouse gas emissions.
| Scarblac wrote:
| And the reverse is equally true. What's your point?
|
| Because this is often used as an excuse to do nothing, until
| the other side does it first. And they say the same...
| brummm wrote:
| It's such a bad attempt for the West to wiggle out of its own
| responsibility. Especially the US has a crazy high CO2
| emission per capita. That's a much more damning number that
| should lead to action.
| elliekelly wrote:
| > The only number that matters to the environment is the
| total.
|
| This is such flawed reasoning if you actually want to
| accomplish anything. When everyone thinks of the issue as an
| all-or-nothing problem everyone will act in their own
| interest. It's always better for the prisoners to defect. But
| when one prisoner has the benefit of knowing the other
| prisoner's decision then everything changes.
| vkou wrote:
| > The only number that matters to the environment is the
| total.
|
| The only number that matters to humans is the quota per
| _capita_. It 's how we set _policy_.
|
| What is the per-capita carbon budget that you'd like to
| assign to the US, the EU, and to China? If those numbers are
| different, why? If they are the same, which region exceeds
| them, and by how much?
| convolvatron wrote:
| alot of people while maybe stating support for the notion
| of human equality would nonetheless have problems assigning
| the same amount of resources to everyone.
|
| after all, that would pretty much screw your lovely market
| ceejayoz wrote:
| I'm not sure why this is being downvoted so hard. If you
| don't go per-capita, there's no sensible way to measure and
| compare emissions.
|
| If a country splits in two (something like Yugoslavia or
| Sudan), has its emissions halved? If a city gobbles up its
| neighbor, has that city's emissions doubled?
| ceejayoz wrote:
| > The only number that matters to the environment is the
| total.
|
| Why count only cities, then?
| relativ575 wrote:
| > the title is a bit misleading
|
| Was it the original title? Neither Reuter's article nor the
| study is titled as such.
|
| > but admits that
|
| This is a study by a university in China. Not sure what you
| mean by "admit"? It's the fact that a large amount of
| greenhouse emission is driven by a handful of cities
| predominantly in China. It's also the fact that, per capita,
| Western countries still emit more.
|
| > instead, our collective complacency and greed drives us to
| subtly blame developing countries striving for parity with the
| west, rather than tackling the problem with economic might and
| wild abandon
|
| Perhaps you have a bigger point to make, because this article
| is very far from blaming. Also, the same point is essentially
| regurgitated in every article mentioned China's or India's
| responsibility in fighting pollution. Make no mistake, they do
| bear large responsibility, if only because they control over
| what can happen within their borders.
| hikerclimber1 wrote:
| I don't believe this article.
| beervirus wrote:
| > almost all of them in China
|
| Shocker.
| screye wrote:
| This article and the linked paper, rustle my jimmies. If there
| was a time to pull out one of my favorite quotes it is now; :
| "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and
| statistics". - Sir Charles Dilke In per capita
| terms, however, emissions from cities in the richest parts of the
| world are still generally higher than those from urban centres in
| developing countries*
|
| So exactly the opposite of what the article's title is saying. I
| bet the emissions from smaller gas guzzler car-centric suburbs
| with non-scalable infrastructure are even higher.
| In terms of sectors, the GHG emissions from the stationary energy
| uses (such as residential, commercial, and industrial buildings)
| and transportation sector contributed the most*
|
| So cars continue to be the biggest contributor. Another point on
| the side of dense cities that can replace cars with public
| transport or biking/walking. https://www.fronti
| ersin.org/files/Articles/696381/frsc-03-696381-HTML/image_m/frsc-
| 03-696381-g001.jpg
|
| This grossly under labelled photo seems to point towards Atlanta,
| Charlotte, Denver, St. Louis, LA/SD and Perth as the biggest
| offenders in the developed world. All of which are famously car
| centric. i have no idea what is going on in melbourne. Its per
| capita commercial building costs are through the roof, especially
| for a place with such moderate weather.
|
| Chinese cities are remarkably inefficient on the surface, but
| most of their energy consumption seems to come from 'industrial
| buildings'. The primary course (paper) does not elaborate on what
| constitutes industrial buildings. https://www.
| frontiersin.org/files/Articles/696381/frsc-03-696381-HTML/image_m
| /frsc-03-696381-g004.jpg
|
| Another grossly under-labelled graph shows the standout cities in
| per-capita delta. (why is there no per capita graph for the bar
| chart, smh). Seattle has done remarkably well, probably due to
| massive increase in population (denominator goes up) and
| replacement of manufacturing (Boeing) with Tech. But that's just
| speculation on my side. I have no clue what is going on with
| Venice ? Reclamation efforts ? Houston also seems an odd
| excellent performer. I wonder if it is due to a fast increasing
| population that is mostly settling in condos in the city instead
| of suburbs on the outskirts. ___________
|
| I disagree with the focus of the conclusions in the paper.
|
| My conclusion:
|
| 1. Road transportation is the main contributor to emissions in
| medium-large sized sparse cities. Instead of targeting per-capita
| efficient mega cities like Bangkok and Seoul without much head-
| room left, we should look at per-capita leaders like Atlanta,
| Perth and LA/SD to make improvements.
|
| 2. Someone needs to take a closer look at what China's
| 'industrial emissions' are. They are off the charts, and far
| outpace anything the rest of the world puts forth.
|
| 3. When people say : "The developing world's abuse of coal is
| causing huge emissions and the Paris climate accords don't
| address it'; they should say China and China exclusively. Other
| country's emissions are an order of magnitude off from Chinese
| cities at both absolute and per capita numbers. India's and SEA's
| cities are remarkably efficient. (probably due to
| underdevelopment, but still) (If this is due to the world
| exporting its manufacturing to China, then stringent trade laws
| on emissions will either lead to increased downstream prices in
| consuming countries or manufacturing will return to
| developed/greener countries due to cleaner infrastructure/tech. I
| am fine with both).
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(page generated 2021-08-09 23:01 UTC)