Pollution In China Could Be Driving Freak Weather In US 158
Hugh Pickens DOT Com (2995471) writes "Jonathan Kaiman reports at The Guardian that China's air pollution could be intensifying storms over the Pacific Ocean and altering weather patterns in North America leading to more ... warm air in the mid-Pacific moving towards the north pole. 'Mid-latitude storms develop off Asia and they track across the Pacific, coming in to the west coast of the U.S.,' says Ellie Highwood, a climate physicist at the University of Reading. 'The particles in this model are affecting how strong those storms are, how dense the clouds are, and how much rainfall comes out of those storms.' Fossil fuel burning and petrochemical processing in Asia's rapidly developing economies lead to a build-up of aerosols, fine particles suspended in the air. Typically, aerosol formation is thought of as the antithesis to global warming: it cools our Earth's climate. But researchers say, too much of any one thing is never good. 'Aerosols provide seeds for cloud formation. If you provide too many seeds, then you fundamentally change cloud patterns and storm patterns,' says co-author Renyi Zhang. China's leaders are aware of the extent of the problem and will soon revise China's environmental protection law for the first time since 1989 ... 'The provisions on transparency are probably the most positive step forward,' says Alex Wang, expert in Chinese environmental law at UCLA. 'These include the requirement that key polluters disclose real-time pollution data.'"
Interesting times (Score:3)
China? Tempests on the other side of the world?
It's clearly a quantum weather butterfly [lspace.org]
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I bet if you got any typical Climate Scientists drunk and just partied with them, it would eventually spill out that they have no fucking clue what they are doing.
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I bet if you got any typical Climate Scientists drunk and just partied with them, it would eventually spill out that they have no fucking clue what they are doing.
Of course, because the Koch brothers have told us that the scientists are the side of this that are just in if for the money, sitting there in their big mansions with their bling, super sports cars and supermodels.
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Man, I wish I was a scientist.
So I could be bought off by the Koch brothers.
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"Do the Kock[sic] brothers spend more on elections than other billionaires?"
Yes, through many personal donation and other organization set up solely to fund more money.
They also get pundit to repeat whatever they want, regardless of truth. See Glenn beck thanking them for the information he says about Climate Change.
However, that's besides the point.
They pay a lot of money to organization who specifically fund global warming deniers.
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It's cheaper for the deniers. They don't need to do the research. They primarily say "your research isn't good enough, go back and fix it, then we'll talk."
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They pay a lot of money to organization who specifically fund global warming deniers.
They tried that with Richard Muller and BEST but it kind of backfired.
Re:Or it could be (Score:5, Interesting)
I bet if you got any typical Climate Scientists drunk and just partied with them, it would eventually spill out that they have no fucking clue what they are doing.
My father-in-law is actually a "climate scientist", or at least a high-ranking mathematician for GSFC. He's Russian, so he and his friends actually care little about environmentalism and pollution and littering and social responsibility and other stuff like that, even though they are at times the outdoorsy-type who do like to go hiking and camping in large groups and playing and singing music loudly to the annoyance of nearby campers.
What he does care about is math, and the mathematical models for tuning and interpreting satellite LIDAR and other instruments, and if you're doing the math wrong he will yell at you condescendingly. He does get annoyed, however, at all of the politics that are getting in the way of the schedules and funding for his next satellite launch.
A lot of his work involves collecting data on cloud and vegetation cover, and how that affects the energy balance. Pollution and airborne aerosols often seed clouds and serve to reflect solar energy back into space, so being able to measure the effects of that would give us a better picture of how fossil fuel consumption does help "self-regulate" greenhouse gas effects. It probably doesn't help that one of his main projects these days, DSCVR, is essentially known as "Goresat" within GSFC. But essentially these scientists are much too wrapped up in gathering data and facts properly to worry about pushing any social agenda... to them, any form of politicking is just a waste of time and energy and schedule on both sides. There's SCIENCE to be done! :P
Polution tax (Score:2)
Simple; tax all goods on the amount of pollution used in their manufacture. Set the level so that it does not effect the U.S.A. (Europe and Japan use less energy anyway) and problem solved. Will have a nice side effect of making it less worth while off-shoring manufacturing to China where it is largely cheaper because they don't have to worry about pollution. So not only is it good for the environment it is good for jobs.
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Simple; tax all goods on the amount of pollution used in their manufacture.
So that every american has either:
- less things.
- a higher salary.
Oh, but the money goes to the government, so you can lower general taxes! which gets:
- A little less money for those who must buy cheap Chinese products.
- A little more things for those who buy more expensive products.
Great result.
Taxes are a funny toy.
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Except that
Factually wrong (Score:3)
"Taxes never go down"
False. The tax rate for those who made a million dollars a year used to be 90%, now it's 33%
Every income brackets federal taxes has dropped. The richer you are the more they dropped.
"The government can't and won't live within it's means."
Nearly all agency in the Federal government live with in their means. The others are usually dictated by citizens or external factors in unexpected ways during a fiscal year. War, 9/11. natural disaster, etc...
.
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The others are usually dictated by citizens or external factors in unexpected ways during a fiscal year. War, 9/11. natural disaster, etc...
I guess "natural disaster" is one way to describe the Bush tax cuts.
The controversy over our budget deficits are an entirely manufactured one,
made all the more hypocritical because the biggest critics are also the most responsible for it.
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What were the tax rates in 1970? What are the tax rates now? What direction did they go?
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But the tea party assures me that once we rid the world of gays and abortion, the deficits will right themselves!!1!
Another case of spreading lies about your adversaries. Many (not all) within the Tea Party are against homosexuality and elective abortions, but these perceived evils will not / do not have an economic impact. The Tea Party is about local governments having more control than the federal government (all powers not given explicitly to the federal government in the Constitution is reserved for the States or the Individuals). Being Pro-life and Pro-Traditional Marriage is not core to the Tea Party.
The deficits
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- A little less money for those who must buy cheap Chinese products.
- A little more things for those who buy more expensive products.
Great result.
Taxes are a funny toy.
And a little more money in the pockets of workers who make these more expensive (domestic) products.
Comment removed (Score:4)
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Care to explain how a revenue neutral shift in tax base changes who gets government assistance?
Of course:
1 - Tax Chinese items. -> Chinese items go up in price.
2 - Lower general tax with the benefits generated by (1) -> everyone has more money.
[However one must take into account that the money distributed by (2) is the same as the one generated by (1). Therefore]
3 - If an individual buys Chinese items for an exact value such as the tax (1) of those items equals the increase (2) of that individual's money, he ends just as rich as before both (1) and (2).
[However]
4 - If an individual buys more th
Re:Wut? (Score:4, Interesting)
On the other hand, Chinese products will go up in price compared to now, so more manufacturing will happen in the U.S. The poor are disproportionatly likely to work in manufacturing, so their employment will increase, making them less poor. As they become less poor, they become less likely to buy Chinese products.
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Just do what the EU did and demand better quality. We introduced RoHS for a reason, and now are looking at ways to make manufacturing cleaner in China too. They need to sell to us, we are massive market (bigger than the US) so what we say they have to abide by. If we say only so much CO2 and PM2.5 per product they have no choice but to clean up and meet those requirements.
Just to be clear, RoHS wasn't just about protecting us from harmful stuff, it was about eliminating it from the manufacturing process and
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My answer is to put a 500% tax on all US companies that do not manufacture their products in the USA.
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I'll ignore your stupid 500% for now.
What about the foreign companies that do not manufacture their products here? Are you also going to impose a... *sigh* ... 500% tariff?
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Hey! That's a good idea. Put a 500% tariff on everything that's not made here. Who care who makes it?
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Hey! That's a good idea. Put a 500% tariff on everything that's not made here. Who care who makes it?
Brazil does this. Since Nikes cost $300 a pair, the local manufacturers can get away with charging $165 for a pair of sneakers. That's just under a week's median wages.
All these policies do is keep the people poor. It's a non-zero-sum game with losses on all sides.
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You know what is more effective at keeping people poor? Barriers on immigration. You can't serious about the free market if you push for the free flow of products, but not the free flow of people.
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That sounds more like a market failure. Given adequate competition, surely someone would be tempted to charge $155 and make a killing...
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Raging Stupidity like buying Nike shows is what keeps people poor. Only idiots buy "name brands" or brands that have a retard culture that surrounds it. Like the moronic wearing flat brimmed hats with the tags still on them. Only the mentally retarded do that.
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You should explain why you think that's a bad thing.
Re:Polution tax (Score:5, Insightful)
ahem ahem .... next time you go to walmart, the cheapest microwave oven is going to be $800 ... ahem ahem, next time you go to buy a light bulb, the cheapest is going to be 3 for $25 ... ahem ahem .... next time you buy an iphone, it is going to be $0 which comes with 15 years contract ... ahem ahem ... just saying.
And since the prices go up and replacement is not something you want to have to do very often. Maybe we stop buying based upon what is cheapest and stop getting something that cannot be repaired and is essentially disposable after one use, and we start buying on quality and repairability. Everything is designed for the landfill these days. it didn't use to be that way before we started importing "cheap" junk.
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Also it increases demand for local labour, as you won't be sending that microwave to china to get repaired
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Because the 'Product of USA' things I can buy have still been manufactured in China, but final assembly and packaging was done in the US and the price was marked up accordingly...
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People don't throw phones away because the can't be repaired. They throw them away because they now have a newer nicer one.
Speak for yourself. I threw out my iPhone when the WiFi failed on it. I still have the Nexus 4 I bought. I don't buy the latest and greatest phone "just because" but then, I don't have a contract which encourages that kind of idiotic behavior.
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Not everyone can afford a car either. Or a helicopter. Are you the one thats going to decide what is a necessity and what is not? Mind you, 20years ago nobody head microwaves.
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I had to look that up because we had a microwave when I was a kid in the 70s. 47 years ago nobody had microwaves [wikipedia.org]
Tariffs are not likely to reduce pollution, they may have some benefits for local business but I doubt it will be beneficial enough for the consumer to benefit.
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ahem ahem .... next time you go to walmart, the cheapest microwave oven is going to be $800
This will move us back from the throw away mentality we're at now by making it more economical to repair than replace. It will also create jobs, as now we need the repair shops we once had. Maybe it'll bring back quality to the products as well, who knows? It'll be a good thing, at any rate, for both the environment and us.
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Actually, I think my microwave oven cost me closer to $1000. But that's because I bought it long before cheap crap from China. Unlike the cheap crap, it still works fine. Amortized over the years, it's been cheaper than the Wal-Mart junk.
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Exactly. You'll get more jobs both due to local manufacture and local repairs. Many of these jobs will have relatively light education requirements, which is probably a good thing.
One could also try making the tax percentages more progressive (as in tax percentage increasing as income is increasing), maybe increase the minimum salary from which any tax is levied, and include a few basic things such as health insurance, emergency responce (firefighting and ambulance), and proper education in the tax bill. Th
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Labour costs on a microwave are $700? Wow we need to outsource to the USA at once!
Re:Polution tax (Score:5, Insightful)
If the microwave was repairable/servicable with magnetron parts available for example, there wouldn't be anything wrong with an $800 unit. In fact, going back to appliances that are designed to be repaired rather than replaced is probably one of the best ideas that can happen in the market.
One example of this are portable generators. I can buy a no-name Chinese model inverter on the cheap. However, if I need to find a carb, jets, brushes, or other parts, I -might- be able to adapt something, or I might just be SOL and have to buy a new one. Or, I can pay the price premium for a Honda, Yamaha, or Champion make, and be able to find parts almost anywhere.
If LED light bulbs mature enough so they have a long MTBF, then three for $25 is a good deal. That isn't a bad thing either.
Similar with a phone. If it were made somewhat modular where RAM, flash storage, and other parts were upgradable, with the antenna being easily swapped out, then paying twice as much for the device wouldn't be a bad thing.
It would be nice to see something other than the absolute race to the bottom when it comes to materials, fit/finish, customer support, and overall quality.
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Similar with a phone. If it were made somewhat modular where RAM, flash storage, and other parts were upgradable, with the antenna being easily swapped out, then paying twice as much for the device wouldn't be a bad thing.
What, like this [theguardian.com], you mean?
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It wouldn't be nearly that much, also..so what? you argument is people would by less shit, keep what they have longer, and give a trong market incentive to find cleaner ways to manufacture goods.
To which I say: Good.
"Ahem ahem" makes you sound like a non-thinking jack ass.
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Say what? Median household income in the US is $51K. The poverty line for a family is about $2K/month, and 15% of the people are below that. There is no support at all for your claim that 'most families' in the US live on $1000/month.
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Not if it means they can quit that shitty job at McD's and double their income as a microwave oven assembly worker.
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Or because their manufacturing jobs went to China.
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That is not how the USA works.
The proper USA response is....
WAR ON CHINA!!!!!
and it will be really good for our economy, it will bring back manufacturing to the USA as well.
Fucking Daily KOS... (Score:1, Insightful)
...and the Democrat Underground have both infested Slashdot.
You want to see economic ignorance incarnate? Just come to Slashdot where a bunch of unemployed college students will vomit back all manner of Marxist, Stalinist, Leninist and Maoists economic theory poured into their giant, empty heads by their professors.
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We keep those people next to the Ayn Rand fans, and cook popcorn. No matter what stupid idea it is, it's probably on Slashdot somewhere.
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Given that the US is (as you correctly point out) among the most profligate and inefficient economies in the world, setting the tax so that it didn't affect the US would mean setting it so that it didn't affect anyone anywhere. which would be entirely pointless.
So stop buying (so much) chinese stuff (Score:2, Insightful)
Its easy to blame China for massive pollution, but it's industry is merely trying to satisfy massive demand, mostly western.
They cannot be expected to adopt first world environmental standards that took decades for the west to develop. Also US/Euro companies outsourcing manufacturing, are dodging domestic environmental regulations to save on costs. So here at least, no one to blame but the west.
In a way, this reminds me of the financial crisis when it was brewing. We could blame the property developers for
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They cannot be expected to adopt first world environmental standards that took decades for the west to develop.
Why not? We developed the products and now they make them. Why can't they employ the pollution-control technology we developed?
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Because if they did it would probably be no cheaper than manufacturing them in North America or Europe, and shipping them over. A large part of what makes manufacturing in China cheaper is that you can pollute like crazy. It is also not just smog from air pollution, but pouring toxic waste into rivers etc.
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The real reason why manufacturing is cheaper in China is labor costs, though. Which is why stuff that's heavily automated is often done in the US, despite the more stringent environmental restrictions.
Then again, my position on toxins is that everything that a factory emits that isn't a profitable product means someone hasn't been thinking efficiently. Coal tar, SO2, heavy metals, ash - if they're reclaimed and put to gainful employment you get a cleaner environment and more profit.
Butterfly (Score:1)
Re:Butterfly (Score:4, Funny)
except it's a butterfly dropping dead from the lack of breathable air.
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So, when it hits the ground, it will cause an earthquake in Wyoming? Damn Chinese, even trying to mess with our fracking...
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except it's a butterfly dropping dead from the lack of breathable air.
"Let a thousand butterflies drop dead".
Mao. Or maybe not.
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next to Chinese Journalist
More transparency is always a good thing (Score:2)
Especially when it's in reference to the air like substance that surrounds most large Chinese cities.
So that's who to blame... (Score:2)
I slipped and busted my ass on a patch of ice outside of my apartment this morning.
That's who's to blame!
I'm so relieved! (Score:2)
Thank goodness for transparency. I mean, we all know how honest and forthcoming Chinese and Chinese-American businesses are. They're just like Western corporations now.
Surely they wouldn't lie, would they?
Chem Trails (Score:1)
How we put some blame on the fleets of planes deploying chemtrails all at the same time and in a pattern? I see it everytime there is a clear day.
Smog is an easy problem to solve (Score:2)
FIlters on coal fired power stations and industrial chimneys, catalysts and DPFs on vehicles and a ban on coal heating in cities. Why China can't manage these simple tasks is anyones guess. Its not like they don't have the money.
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The ones who own the polluting factories are far from poor and live nowhere near them. The people who work for them are dirt poor and have to breath the pollution.
Not to worry... (Score:2)
Whew! Nice to know they're on top of this now.
No shit guys ... (Score:4, Insightful)
That's why climate change is a global thing.
Are people laboring under the belief that this will result in purely localized effects?
There is only one atmosphere, and if you screw it up, it's screwed up everywhere.
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Religion of the Month Club (Score:2)
One of the side stories was a character who was a member of the Religion of the Month Club. The tagline was: "How can you be sure African Bantu isn't the True Way!!?"
Original IPCC report said 10 countries make 70 pct (Score:1)
The original IPCC scientific report stated that 70 percent of the climate change emissions were coming from just 10 countries, of which two of the largest were the US and China.
But they removed that, because then those countries might have to actually change their behavior and stop shipping US coal to China.
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Sit tight; OCO2 is coming (Score:2)
What about the great pacific garbage patch (Score:1)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_garbage_patch
Could it be affecting our weather, too?
Re:china has smog, so its clearly chinas fault. (Score:5, Informative)
Well, you clearly refused to RTFA. They used high-fidelity models and derived at the conclusion that an amazing increase in particulate has affected weather patterns by increasing cloud formation. This is not complext like the 3rd order effects of CO2 which cause AGW, this is a first order affect. It's not complex. You apparently are just as irrationally religious about AGW as the deniers are.
And oh by the way, the western world has rigorous particulate limits that continue to be advanced because we're aware of this.
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True, however, this is talking about how the pollution in china changing the weather patterns in the Pacific, which in turn changes the weather patterns for the U.S.
I am sure if they looked at the data, they would also find that pollution in the U.S. is changing weather patterns in the Atlantic, which in turn changes the weather patterns in Europe.
The article is not saying that China is to blame for global warming, it is just saying that China is to blame for the intense weather swings. For instance, here
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This particular effect is not attributed to global pollution levels, but specifically to the northern Pacific zone. Given the known, prevailing wind patterns, it's pretty clear that China has the greatest impact on this particular area.
Of course, AGW is also a huge part of the overall problem, and the USA is a major contributor (the major contributor per capita), but TFA article is not really about AGW per se, it's about a a regional weather trend which happens to affect a neighboring region, North America.
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Per capita statistics on energy use aren't very useful. Americans are also productive. If your method of measuring efficiency is per capita usage, then places like the favorite Marxist straw man of Somalia (and favorite neocon straw man of North Korea) would rate very highly.
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We also invent half the shit that's invented every year. Other nations need to be more like us, not the other way around...if concern for the comman man is your standard.
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You may be productive but your houses suck. They are poorly insulated and you waste a lot of energy heating and cooling them. Compare them to German homes that need only a fraction of the energy to maintain a pleasant environment.
The reason for this is that the US hates socialism. Germany mandated that new homes are well insulated and low energy, and provided improvements at little or no cost to existing ones. In the US such things are expensive extras and since energy is extremely cheap most people don't s
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You provided a population-energy ratio. I would love to know what pollution-energy ratio, and a GDP per capita/energy ratio. Do you have a source I can peruse?
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http://www.eia.gov/ [eia.gov]
also the IEA(not to be confused with the eia above))
https://www.iea.org/co2highlig... [iea.org]
Re:china has smog, so its clearly chinas fault. (Score:5, Informative)
Americans constitute 5% of the worlds population, yet we consume 24% of its energy.
Please stop using this bogus comparison to imply that Americans use more than "their share" of the world's energy. The correct comparison is between inputs and outputs. The USA produces nearly 20% of the world's GDP. [quandl.com] If your 24% is correct, we have room for improvements in energy efficiency, but we're not nearly the energy gluttons that you're suggesting. The low ratio of population to energy use is largely due to our high productivity. [wikipedia.org]
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Also what is so important about GDP. Why do we need so much of it? And if i have more of it, will i be happier?
Yes i have done a bit of economics. But really economics makes some pretty arbitrary measures of what is productive.
Re:china has smog: LA has chinas smog. (Score:2)
It is widely reported in So. Cal. media that 25% of Los Angeles County's smog comes from Asia/China.
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You also need to find out, on average, how much pollution is generated per million KWh.
If I use more energy then you do, but it's all solar, then I will emit far less gasses and particulates in to the atmosphere.
That example was only to illustrated my point.
China per capita Energy usage includes a lot of people who have little or no electricity.
China use more coal the any other country, and there coal emission standards are very, very low.
So, the amount of crap the put in the air is substantial, and more th
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"Americans constitute 5% of the worlds population, yet we consume 24% of its energy."
Why dont you also mention what percentage we are of the worlds energy ~production~?
If we produce more than 24% of the worlds energy, than using 24% is nothing to be ashamed of.
Except that a) most countries cope on rather much less, making it seem rather wasteful, consuming resources and generating pollution and b) the pollution doesn't stay in the US (just like China's doesn't stay in China...