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U.S. and China Make Landmark Climate Deal
An anonymous reader writes: After extended talks on the issue of climate change, the U.S. and China have reached a landmark accord to curb emissions in the near future. The two countries are the top carbon polluters, so their actions are likely to have a major effect on world pollution levels and also set the standard for other countries. The agreement includes China's first-ever commitment to stop the growth of its emissions by 2030. They plan on shifting a big chunk of their energy production to renewables in that time. The U.S. agreed to emit 26-28% less carbon in 2025 than it did in 2005. Their efforts could spur greater enthusiasm for a new global climate agreement in 2015.
Reader jones_supa adds details of another interesting part of the U.S.-China talks:
Technology products look likely to gain more access to international markets as a result of upgrade between the U.S. and China on a 1996 tariff-eliminating trade agreement that President Obama announced Tuesday in Beijing. The agreement is expected to lower prices on a raft of new technology products by eliminating border tariffs — a price impact that's expected to be larger outside the United States, since U.S. tariffs on high-tech goods are generally lower than those overseas. "This is a win-win-win agreement for information and communication technology industries in the U.S., Europe, Japan and China, for businesses and consumers who purchase IT products and for the global economy."
Those are silly numbers because they are only measurements of domestic emissions.
Around half of China's carbon emissions are because of productions of goods that are exported to mainly USA and the EU. You could say that while USA and EU are importing from China, they are exporting their emissions to China.
If you take that into account, USA and EU are much worse per capita.
I am in Sweden, which has one of the strongest economies in the EU, having got mostly unscathed out of the recent Euro crisis (Sweden still has its own currency).
Sweden has one of the lowest carbon emissions per capita in the EU, but because the economy is so strong, Swedish citizens are spending more money on imported goods than other EU citizens and are therefore among the worst polluters in the EU if you take trade into account.
"We mustn't be caught by surprise by our own advancing technology" -- Aldous Huxley
The republican solution to fixing everything is to make it cheaper for business, particularly big business, by levelling the playing field with places like China, completely ignoring that we would then be marinating in our own pollution and likely lowering our standard of living even further to do so. Still, it has been seen time and time again that you can get people to vote against their best interest if you spend enough money on it.
My own solution to try to equalize things a bit is to start to gradually tariff/tax things that are made with less rigid standards in the United States. For instance, if an Iphone is made with working conditions we would not tolerate and a lot of pollution is created in the process then we tariff that enough so that it is possible for the US to compete. Similarly things like coal plants that likely cause a lot of secondary health problems, particularly if they don't have up to date technology, should have to pay for the external health costs. That way cleaner tech can fairly compete. Society as a whole pays the total bill. It makes no sense to save money one place only to be forced to spend a total amount that is greater.
Clearly this agreement was delayed precisely because it would have cost the Democrats more seats in the election. But, given that even the Democrats in the Senate voted against Kyoto, which was tame in comparison, it has no chance of getting through.
Of course, since the President has a pen, I'm sure this won't even be submitted to the Senate, and he'll attempt to enforce it through the EPA, or some other anti-American Federal agency.
Which would explain the Obamacare architect saying that the American people are stupid. Liberals are elites who think they know better than everyone else, what is good for everyone, except themselves. Hence, you have Al Gore running around screaming (often literally) about global warming while living in a mansion that exceeds the average person's yearly carbon footprint every month. But he is okay, because he buys carbon offsets from himself.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.