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China loves coal

Loren Pechtel said:
China really loves coal:

http://phys.org/news/2015-11-china-coal-figures-billions-tonnes.html

They were understating by an amount that's a major fraction of our total use!
Click to expand...

Their overstated use could be twice our total use and still be a smaller percentage of their total use than it is of our total use. Its situations like the one I just noted that makes talking politically about coal and pollution tough. No matter how one tries to say China is bad they will be able to show we are worse per capita. Even showing Beijing as a really bad LA visual doesn't get there because the percentage of their population that is being directly impacted is less than the percentage of US population was impacted by LA's condition in the '70s and other reasons like LA is blocked from ridding gasses much worse than is Beijing.

Now a scientific discussion, if it wraps itself around pollutants per pound of coal citing impacts per person of such amounts, might get somewhere as might discussion about methods to reduce these effects per person or mitigate them through alternative use of energy forms per person.

China has a huge advantage with its population in a political discussion. If the discussion is effect per person then the cost per ll be less odious because when population is large and per capita income is low effects and remedies can be compared in what appears fair on a national income and productivity basis between us.
 
I love the pure illogic of the argument that goes 'China is making things worse, therefore we should stop trying to make things better'.

It's like you are in a leaky boat, baling out as fast as you can, and some guy says "Hey, I just inspected the damage, and the hole is bigger than we thought, so you are all wasting your time and should stop baling".

If China is making things worse, then we need to do MORE, not less.

If China is making things worse to the point were we cannot avoid disaster, then we STILL need to do MORE, to keep the scale of disaster as small as possible.

If there is a problem, then we don't need to know what China is or is not doing in order to know what we should do; If there isn't a problem, then we also don't need to know what China is or isn't doing.

It is a huge red herring (hey, it's Chinese; what other colour would it be?).
 
bilby said:
I love the pure illogic of the argument that goes 'China is making things worse, therefore we should stop trying to make things better'.

It's like you are in a leaky boat, baling out as fast as you can, and some guy says "Hey, I just inspected the damage, and the hole is bigger than we thought, so you are all wasting your time and should stop baling".

If China is making things worse, then we need to do MORE, not less.

If China is making things worse to the point were we cannot avoid disaster, then we STILL need to do MORE, to keep the scale of disaster as small as possible.

If there is a problem, then we don't need to know what China is or is not doing in order to know what we should do; If there isn't a problem, then we also don't need to know what China is or isn't doing.

It is a huge red herring (hey, it's Chinese; what other colour would it be?).
Click to expand...

It's not a huge red herring because the reality is that if they don't sign on our emissions control efforts will to a large extent backfire--we cut our emissions, the energy-intensive industries move to China and emit even more CO2.
 
Why, in an international, political discussion, would 'per person' even be meaningful? This is one, large, geographical location, not x billion people.
The question is around China, as a whole, polluting the rest of the world. To fall for statistical games like 'per capita' is pretty obviously stupid.

this factory is polluting the environment!
but there are 1,000 people working in that factory!
oh, well then the impact on the environment is 1,000 times less, then... somehow.
 
Malintent said:
Why, in an international, political discussion, would 'per person' even be meaningful? This is one, large, geographical location, not x billion people.
The question is around China, as a whole, polluting the rest of the world. To fall for statistical games like 'per capita' is pretty obviously stupid.

this factory is polluting the environment!
but there are 1,000 people working in that factory!
oh, well then the impact on the environment is 1,000 times less, then... somehow.
Click to expand...

It's part of the attitude that all that matters is what we do, not what the result is.
 
Loren Pechtel said:
Malintent said:
Why, in an international, political discussion, would 'per person' even be meaningful? This is one, large, geographical location, not x billion people.
The question is around China, as a whole, polluting the rest of the world. To fall for statistical games like 'per capita' is pretty obviously stupid.

this factory is polluting the environment!
but there are 1,000 people working in that factory!
oh, well then the impact on the environment is 1,000 times less, then... somehow.
Click to expand...

It's part of the attitude that all that matters is what we do, not what the result is.
Click to expand...

Since I wrote it, its to show the political nature of gotcha politics. US looks good if China looks bad. As for bilby's post I agree completely. Australia should cut off its nose to do the earth some good.

My political position is that coal should be eliminated. Out of work coal miners and shippers should be retrained at the expense of the governments for their 'involuntary' sacrifice in energy production in environmentally friendly enterprise and advertising and supports for price differentials should be carried at the peoples' expense as well.

Get serious.
 
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