Per capita emissions aren’t relevant to climate impact. Neither are relative emissions between countries. This is a global issue.
Per capita emissions aren’t relevant to climate impact. Neither are relative emissions between countries. This is a global issue.
Per capita emissions are relevant in the sense that if China broke into ten separate countries tomorrow, with each new country maintaining their current level of emissions, the effect on the planet would be the same even though an entity called “China” is no longer at the top of the leaderboard.
There is some per capita carbon emissions budget such that if each human on earth stayed within that budget, climate change could be mitigated[0]. The average Chinese person exceeds that budget, but does so by significantly less than the average American. So the average American is more at fault for climate change than the average Chinese person is.
Of course, your second claim, that this is a global issue, is correct. But if we solved the global issue in a fair way, China would still emit a few times more CO2 than the US.
0: “Mitigated” rather than totally solved, because to go back to pre-industrial temperatures the budget would have to be negative. But let’s say we’re talking about staying within 2C or some similar goal.
I don’t see the value of expressing a supply side issue in terms of demand. You can’t just ask people to choose clean energy. That happens from the top, not the bottom.
That's not the point.
Why are some people entitled to more than others based on where they live?
The US is the world leader in per capita CO2 emissions. Has been for over a century. Only in 2021 China has reached 8t per capita. Do you know when the US reached that figure? 1899.
The inhabitants of the US, and of the UK before it, have been enjoying the benefits of energy-intensive industry for hundreds of years. But the externality of that process - the emissions - is a burden shared with everyone else in the world. As others have mentioned, the planet does not care who emitted CO2.
None of those countries is in a position to criticize the emissions of China or India or Brazil or whatever other country.
You seem to be conflating CO2 emissions with energy production.
No, but if some people are outputting way more CO2 than others, these are the ones we should be focussing on first.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_di...
The US is fairly high but below Canada, Russia, and many Middle Eastern countries. US emissions have also consistently fallen for the past 25 years or so.
Yes China is outputting way more C02 than the next 6 biggest pollutors combined. Lets focus on them first. They are the only ones not reducing their emission growth.
Serialization is a losing strategy here. “Focus” is irrelevant. We need fundamental shifts in energy production.
> Per capita emissions aren’t relevant to climate impact
They aren't relevant to the climate, but they are relevant to how much energy and wealth you allow each person to have.
Does a person in China deserve to have less energy or wealth than a person in America?
I don’t follow. Energy demands can be met with renewables. We don’t have to decrease energy consumption at all. We only need to eliminate fossil sources.
Per capita emissions are relevant, because it shows how much each separate country needs to improve in a relative manner. Absolute emissions doesn't matter to what each state needs to do.
We all breathe the same air. Every state needs to do everything it can.