About | Contact | Mongabay on Facebook | Mongabay on Twitter | Free newsletter

China's emissions rise 45%, but Western demand accounts for 30% of increase

mongabay.com
February 26, 2009

Thirteen-and-a-half percent of China's 45 percent rise in greenhouse gas emissions between 2002 and 2005 can be attributed to export production for Western countries, reports a new study published in Geophysical Research Letters. In other words, outsourcing of manufacturing by American and European firms accounted for larger share of carbon dioxide emission growth than rising domestic consumption in China (which made of 7 percent of the figure). The results, which indicate that Western companies are effectively outsourcing emissions along with manufacturing, have implications for future climate treaties, says one of the authors.

"This makes us reflect on how we are a part of a global system, and how we partly drive emissions in other countries. It is important to take at least some responsibility for problems that we cause indirectly in other countries," said author Glen Peters of the Center for Climate and Environmental Research in Oslo.

The Kyoto Protocol doesn't account for carbon leakage, where emissions are essentially displaced from one country to another. Peters says future climate agreements will need to address this in order to be effective.

"We do not need to completely redesign Kyoto, but we could include incremental changes that address carbon leakage and competitiveness concerns," he said. "Climate policy could be designed in similar ways to existing tax policy. For example we could design carbon taxes in a similar way to value-added taxation which covers imported products. In that way the consumer would pay for the emissions caused by his or her consumption."

Related

Industrialized countries outsource CO2 emissions to China June 2, 2007
Facing criticism as it surpasses the U.S. as the world's largest producer of carbon dioxide, China says that industrialized countries are hypocritical for criticizing its greenhouse gas emissions while buying its products, according to the Associated Press. China argues that developed countries are effectively outsourcing emissions by shifting manufacturing to its factories

CITATION:
mongabay.com (February 26, 2009).

China's emissions rise 45%, but Western demand accounts for 30% of increase.

http://news.mongabay.com/2009/0226-china.html

Tags:
china china's demand for resources carbon dioxide carbon emissions asia environment green

print

Environmental news index | RSS | News Feed | Twitter | Home

Advertisements:

T-shirts, shopping bags, calendars, and more.

DON'T LIKE ADS? Become a mongabay supporter

WEEKLY NEWSLETTER

RECENT FEATURES

		Looking for a yeti? Use leeches
		Cinderella animals
		Uncontacted tribes spotted in Colombia
		17 celebrated scientists on how to make a better world

Photos

Brazil	China	Colombia
Costa Rica	Deforestation	Gabon
India	Indonesia	Kenya
Madagascar	Peru	Rainforest

ABOUT
Mongabay.com seeks to raise interest in and appreciation of wild lands and wildlife, while examining the impact of emerging trends in climate, technology, economics, and finance on conservation and development (more)

Help support mongabay.com when you buy from Amazon.com

BOOKS BY MONGABAY AUTHORS

Conservation in an age of mass extinction

FREE WEEKLY NEWSLETTER

HIGH RESOLUTION PHOTOS / PRINTS

Copyright mongabay 2010

Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions generated from mongabay.com operations (server, data transfer, travel) are mitigated through an association with Anthrotect,
an organization working with Afro-indigenous and Embera communities to protect forests in Colombia's Darien region.
Anthrotect is protecting the habitat of mongabay's mascot: the scale-crested pygmy tyrant.