Emissions per person in parts of China above rich nations, Stern says 1

BEIJING - One of the world’s top authorities on climate change warned Friday that carbon emissions per person in parts of China were higher than in some developed countries.

Nicholas Stern, the British author of an acclaimed review on climate change, told students in Beijing’s People’s University that 13 Chinese provinces, regions and cities had higher per capita emissions than France. Six also overtook Britain.

“There are many parts of China where emissions intensity and emissions per capita are looking much like some of the richer countries in Europe,” he said in a speech that laid out his predictions on global warming.

Stern warned that if the world continued to emit around the same levels of greenhouse gases every year, there was a 50 percent chance temperatures would rise more than five degrees Celsius (nine degrees Fahrenheit) within 100 years.

A rise of “five degrees Celsius has not been seen on this planet for 30 million years—we as humans have been here for only 200,000 years,” he said. “This type of temperature change involves radical dislocation, it involves re-writing where people can live, it would involve the movement of hundreds of millions, probably billions, of people. This would result in extended, serious global conflict.”

Stern’s comments came ahead of a key summit in Copenhagen in December aimed at hammering out a new climate change pact to cut emissions.

China and other developing nations are opposed to any compulsory cuts in emissions, saying their per capita emissions are low and the responsibility for solving the problem rests with developed countries that have polluted longer.

Based on Stern’s calculations, emissions per person worldwide would have to fall to two tonnes by 2050 to minimize the risk of a dangerous rise in temperature.

Currently, according to Stern, China emits six tonnes per person, the European Union emits an average of 12, and the United States 25.

Stern, a noted economist, said he was confident China would lead on climate change action.

“China will use its leadership ... to explain to the developed world what their obligations are, and China will support developing countries as a whole,” he said.

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