you just laid out a great plan for public investment.  Congrats!  And yes, I think that would inspire China (and India), because, unfortunately, the people in both countries seem to think that the US of A is at the pinnacle of civilization, which blows my mind because they are both very old civilizations with very rich histories.  

Another problem with China though -- it is precisely in order to avoid becoming democratic that the regime is driving the ecology to ruin in an attempt to maintain their legitimacy by making everybody middle-class -- american middle-class.  Democracy would do wonders for China, because as the USSR showed, a lack of democracy leads to the worst ecological offenses possible.

I agree. China changed profoundly when it copied a Western style of industrialization, and it is fully capable of changing again, and copying a new style of energy and life-conserving development.

But what I think we in this country have difficulty understanding about China is how little control the central government exerts over industry. For example, they have no laws regulating food safety. (Bribery, yes, but laws against adding, say, a coal scrap product called melanine to animal feed? No.) For example, thousands of Chinese coal miners die every year in "accidents" we in this country barely hear about and would not tolerate. And so on.

If our government demands changes, chances are infinitely better than China too will make changes. If we do not, chances are good they will not, either, which will do neither of us good.

As the Bush administration said (regarding North Korea) yesterday, "In this world you must give something to get something."

So to believe...that only cheap clean energy can persuade China to develop differently, you have to believe that China is willing to condemn the entire world -- including itself -- to a future of drought, floods, disease, desertification, and rising sea levels. The idea that China would be immune to such considerations strikes me as a piece of cultural condescension, perhaps borderline xenophobia.

No. You only have to assume that China is just as capable of self-delusion as the US (or, to be fair, most of the world). The US has "known about" Global Warming for quite some time now, and what has been the result? There may be promising developments, much like there have been promising developments for hydrogen fuel cells, etc. But nothing yet that points the way definitively, or even probably, to a low-carbon future. We may have left it till too late, and there's no reason to believe that, whatever their motives, ego- or altro- that they'll get their act together any better than the West. I thought that was S&N's premise, and the reason we need to pursue other avenues.

Blue sky, or pie-in-the-sky? Don't get me wrong: I'm an eternal optimist. But that doesn't mean I'm naive. Of course we need to envision a better paradigm, but we can't just keep saying "it would be great if..." without putting meat on them bones. Saying "we need a paradigm shift" is not a solution.That's the environmentalist's curse, and again, I thought that was S&N's point. We need to start playing with the cards we've been dealt.

So please, Mr Roberts, don't just tack your blue sky idea onto the end of a blog post. We've seen a lot of injured reaction to S&N's proposals, yet no one has really taken up the gauntlet--at least, I haven't seen anyone else deal adequately with the "elephant". S&N's is still the best plan because it's the only plan. If you don't like that, then do something about it.
]]> A couple of issues, in defense of S&N...

So to believe...that only cheap clean energy can persuade China to develop differently, you have to believe that China is willing to condemn the entire world -- including itself -- to a future of drought, floods, disease, desertification, and rising sea levels. The idea that China would be immune to such considerations strikes me as a piece of cultural condescension, perhaps borderline xenophobia.

No. You only have to assume that China is just as capable of self-delusion as the US (or, to be fair, most of the world). The US has "known about" Global Warming for quite some time now, and what has been the result? There may be promising developments, much like there have been promising developments for hydrogen fuel cells, etc. But nothing yet that points the way definitively, or even probably, to a low-carbon future. We may have left it till too late, and there's no reason to believe that, whatever their motives, ego- or altro- that they'll get their act together any better than the West. I thought that was S&N's premise, and the reason we need to pursue other avenues.

Blue sky, or pie-in-the-sky? Don't get me wrong: I'm an eternal optimist. But that doesn't mean I'm naive. Of course we need to envision a better paradigm, but we can't just keep saying "it would be great if..." without putting meat on them bones. Saying "we need a paradigm shift" is not a solution.That's the environmentalist's curse, and again, I thought that was S&N's point. We need to start playing with the cards we've been dealt.

So please, Mr Roberts, don't just tack your blue sky idea onto the end of a blog post. We've seen a lot of injured reaction to S&N's proposals, yet no one has really taken up the gauntlet--at least, I haven't seen anyone else deal adequately with the "elephant". S&N's is still the best plan because it's the only plan. If you don't like that, then do something about it.
]]> http://www.grist.org/article/the-elephant-in-the-environmental-room/ Thu, 04 Oct 2007 09:39:04 -0700 http://www.grist.org/article/the-elephant-in-the-environmental-room/6 Jones, I don't understand....

...the "blue sky" idea is, as far as I can see, similar to N&S in that it implies public investment -- it's definitely a plan (here's my very blue sky plan)

Here's the problem with how we are discussing country to country fossil fuel energy use.  Let me divide fossil fuel use into 2 parts.   one is energy consumption by those that do not have to compete with foreign trade and those that do.

Lets say we put on a tax on the energy use of a Walmart to light and heat their stores.   What Walmart sells in the store, whether its made in America or overseas isn't affected by that tax.  If we were to tax a manufacturer for their energy use may affect whether it can compete against foreign competition.

So just because China, India, or any other country may not tax fossil fuel energy to remain competitive, that would only apply to what energy is used in manufactoring or something that is in export or import competition.   We and other countries could still use carbon energy taxes on non export/import industries.

Certainly a large portion of our fossil fuel energy use is in non export/import industries and we can increase carbon taxes on that use while reducing property, sales, income and social securtity taxes.   And so can other countries.  

    U.S. manufacturers are part of the "Chinese" problem (as are other developed country manufacturers).  They decide what criteria must be met when they buy products.  They tell Chinese (and other developing countries), the criteria is "price, price, price).  

    Any country that needs the income from exports has to meet their customers demands.

    Most developing countries do not have large sums of money lying around waiting to be spent, nor huge bases of rich and middle class citizens they can tax at will.

    If China (for example), says to U.S. customers, we are going to raise the price of goods we sell you so that our factories can use clean power and technology that does not pollute......

    Those customer will be gone to another developing country that is not so picky.

    So, China (and other developing countries)  is (are) caught between a rock and a hard place.

    Americans scream at it that it should spend money it doesn't have to do what America wants, while at the same time demanding prices for goods that make meeting the first demand impossible.

    And then sneer and call it names when it meets the price demand (because otherwise there is no demand).

    Get it?

patrick in beijing

I remember reading that 25 percent of todays carbon dioxide is released for the United States, but that 40 percent of all carbon dioxide released by human activities are from the United States.   The United States just got started sooner releasing carbon dioxide.

Now the United States says everyone has to start now reducing carbon dioxide release (if that's what the government is saying.)   Which is like having someone throwing 100 garbage bags in the corner and then someone else throws a garbage bag in the corner, they are both liable equally for all the garbage bags in the corner.    Since the United States put most of the carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the air, historically, the United States needs to make the most effort to stop doing it and adding to it.

It's not doing enough, but it's not doing nothing.

In 2006, the government enacted a renewable energy law that stipulates that 16% of the country's energy must come from renewables by 2020 (yes, including big hydro).  They are also embarking on a "crash campaign" to increase countrywide energy efficiency by 20% from 2005 to 2010.  They have the largest production volume in the world of solar hot water heaters (1000 manufacturers) and small-scale wind turbines (25 manufacturers.)  All electric utilities are required to facilitate grid connections for renewables and offer net metering.  

And those controversial HFC destruction projects?  The CER money is taxed at 65% and most of it goes to rural electrification wind/hydro projects.

Is all this enough to negate the environmental impact of millions of Chinese becoming first-world consumers?  No.  But from a "carbon intensity" viewpoint, it's more than the U.S. is doing. I think we really need to acknowledge what China is doing, both in the interests of truth and in the interests of encouraging further actions in the same vein.