The Challenge Facing the World's Biggest Polluters

The challenge facing the world's biggest polluters
The clock is ticking in the race to agree a new treaty to cut the emissions that cause global warming. Michael McCarthy names and shames the offenders who must mend their ways
Wednesday, 11 March 2009

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/the-challenge-facing-the-worlds-biggest-polluters-1642109.html

Among the developed countries, the member states of the EU (including Britain) are taking the lead, with firm commitments to reduce CO2 in the medium term

In three weeks' time in Bonn, the international community will begin the negotiations leading up to December's United Nations climate change meeting in Copenhagen, which, it is hoped, will produce a new climate treaty to replace the Kyoto Protocol. If the world is to check the march of global warming before it is too late, it is increasingly clear that this meeting must lead to agreement on worldwide cuts in carbon dioxide (CO2), the principal greenhouse gas – emissions of which from industry, transport and deforestation are responsible for causing the atmosphere to overheat.

Here we present a unique table of the world's 20 biggest CO2 emitters, with details of their economies and populations, and more importantly, what steps they each are already taking – if any – to cut back their emissions. Some points stand out. China has now overtaken the United States as the world's biggest polluter; its carbon emissions have more than doubled in a decade, and with its recent growth rate of nearly 10 per cent, could do so again, depending on the length and depth of the world recession.

India, now the fourth biggest polluter, is also rapidly increasing its emissions, and is increasing its population of 1.15 billion people far faster than any other country in the table; soon its human numbers will be on a par with China's and its emissions following suit. But neither country has set an emissions reduction target since, as developing countries, they feel they should be allowed to continue growing to relieve poverty (India is vocal on this point). Also, as the supplementary table makes clear, if their emissions are treated on a per capita basis, India is the lowest emitter by far, and China is fourth from bottom, instead of top.
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However, some developing countries are taking on emissions targets – Mexico and South Africa stand out – while Brazil has set up a programme to save the Amazon.

Among the developed countries, the member states of the European Union (including Britain) are taking the lead, with firm commitments to reduce CO2 in the medium term. Other high-emitting rich nations, such as Japan, Canada and Australia, have given themselves less taxing targets or have not yet set out their plans in detail. After eight years of inaction and obstructionism under President George Bush, the US, now the second biggest polluter, is back among the climate change coalition of the willing, and President Obama has set out the targets he would like to aim at. However, he may be held back in his ambition by Congress.

If we are to name any laggards, we should point to the oil-exporting countries such as Saudi Arabia and Iran, who are unhappy at the whole idea of cutting carbon and have done very little about it, and also to Russia (the third biggest polluter) and Ukraine, who similarly have shown little appetite for action.

If a workable deal is reached in Copenhagen it will have to involve the developed nations taking on new ambitious targets; but it will also have to mean the developing countries starting to cut back their own CO2, in return for large amounts of developed country aid. In essence, it will be a deal between the US and China, with the rest of the world following. But it is by no means certain that a deal can be put together. Look at our table and you will see just how different are the situations of the different countries in emissions, wealth and population. Bringing them all into a treaty that really means something will be a labour of Hercules – beginning in Bonn, in three weeks' time.

New Greenhouse Gas: MIT Researchers Identify Potent New Greenhouse Gas

New Gas: MIT Researchers Identify Potent New Greenhouse Gas
March 11, 2009

http://blogs.wsj.com/environmentalcapital/2009/03/11/new-gas-mit-researchers-identify-potent-new-greenhouse-gas/
http://blogs.wsj.com/environmentalcapital/2009/03/11/new-gas-mit-researchers-identify-potent-new-greenhouse-gas/tab/print/

The unintended law of consequences strikes again. The 20-year old campaign to save the ozone layer has led to the widespread industrial use of a greenhouse gas 4,800 times more potent than carbon dioxide.

The 1987 Montreal Protocol was established to limit emissions of chlorofluorocarbons and other gases that deplete the ozone layer, the big worry in the 1980s. One of the targeted compounds was methyl bromide, which was widely used in fumigation to kill weevils and mice and other pests that threaten food supplies. Methyl bromide was phased out in 2005.

Dow Chemical´s AgroSciences unit came to the rescue, dusting off research on an old compound called sulfuryl fluoride, which has now become the standard fumigant.

Just one problem, say researchers at MIT: Sulfuryl fluoride lasts a lot longer in the atmosphere than expected and is a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. The good news is that the concentration of Dow´s new fumigant in the atmosphere is still tiny. The researchers will publish their findings, which were compiled with the help of Dow AgroSciences, tomorrow in the Journal of Geophysical Research.

When Dow was pressing for EPA approval of sulfuryl fluoride in 2002 (eventually given in 2004), it didn´t think the new compound presented any global warming threat. In a technical bulletin published then, Dow said:

The relatively small amounts of sulfuryl fluoride released are calculated to have virtually no impact on the global atmosphere. Standard atmospheric modelling indicates that sulfuryl fluoride will have an insignificant contribution to global warming because of the low sulfuryl fluoride to carbon dioxide ratio (< ;0.0001).

The new findings may cause dismay for an industry that just finished complying with one environmental imperative only to find that the cure might have been worse than the disease. But at least the new findings come soon enough to make changes without too much pain, said Ron Prinn, director of MIT´s Center for Global Change Science and a co-author on the new paper. It´s "a new frontier for environmental science - to try to head off potential dangers as early as possible, rather than wait until it´s a mature industry with lots of capital and jobs at stake," he said in a statement.

And making the first switch from methly bromide to sulfuryl fluoride hasn´t exactly kneecaped the fumigation business-the new compound is cheaper and more effective than what it replaced, meaning the environmental imperative also carried business benefits.

The whole imbroglio does underscore how tough it is to foresee the consequences of wide-reaching environmental regulations. The Montreal Protocol proved very effective at curbing ozone-killing emissions. It also proved surprisingly effective-five times more than the Kyoto Protocol-at reducing emissions of known greenhouse gases, which it wasn´t even meant to do.

But saving the ozone layer may slightly exacerbate some aspects of global warming, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found. Some ozone-depleting gases lead to warming, and some-like methyl bromide in particular-help cool temperatures.

US Carbon Emissions 20% Greater Than Official Estimates

U.S. carbon emissions 20% greater than official estimates
by Brian Angliss
January 22, 2009

http://www.scholarsandrogues.com/2009/01/22/us-carbon-emissions-20-greater-than-\
official-estimates/

The role of the United States in climate disruption is far greater than most
people realize. Not only does the U.S. emit more carbon dioxide (CO2) than any
other nation besides China, not only does the U.S. have one the highest
per-capita emissions in the world, but the U.S. economy also accounts for a
massive amount of emissions released by the rest of the world too. S&R has
investigated just how much CO2 the United States economy is actually responsible
for, and the results suggest the real emissions are 20% greater than official
estimates.

Every product and service requires energy, and thus carbon. Commercial
agriculture requires petroleum or natural gas-based fertilizers and diesel fuel
for planting and harvesting. Manufacturing requires energy to extract raw
materials, petroleum to transport those materials to a factory, energy to
convert those materials into products, and yet more petroleum to transport the
products to end users. Even services like housecleaning or website hosting have
an energy cost, the former in the creation of the chemicals and electric
cleaning tools and the latter for the server (a product with its associated
energy cost of creation), the electricity used to run the computer, and the
energy consumed in constructing the computer center that houses the server have
energy costs. And in all cases, the energy cost to create the product or service
creates carbon emissions.

Given this, the amount of CO2 that a product or service indirectly emits in its
creation, transport, and use can be estimated. And by extension the total amount
of CO2 produced by the combined products and services (gross domestic product,
or GDP) of a nation can also be estimated. When the total CO2 produced by a
country by the country’s GDP, the amount of carbon emitted per unit of
economic production can be determined. This is called “carbon intensity.”

The carbon intensity of the United States in 2006 was 0.52 metric tons of CO2
emitted per thousand dollars (indexed for inflation to the value of the dollar
in 2000). For comparison, the carbon intensity of Iceland in 2006 was 0.31
metric tons of CO2 emitted per thousand dollars, and the carbon intensity of
Russia was 4.54 metric tons of CO2 emitted per thousand dollars.

The fact that carbon intensity varies from country to country is a function of
the country’s energy mix and overall productivity - more coal or oil burned
for electricity or heating produces higher carbon intensity, and lots of manual
labor producing valuable products produces a higher carbon intensity too. Large
amounts of manual labor producing inexpensive products produces an extremely low
carbon intensity, as witnessed by the very low carbon intensity of 0.10 metric
tons of CO2 emitted per thousand dollars from Cambodia.

From carbon intensity, the amount of CO2 produced in the process of creating the
goods and services that the U.S. exports - and that other countries export to us
- can be estimated as well. The result is the following graph:
co2emitnations-sm
Figure 1

Figure 1 shows the 15 nations who “export” the most CO2 to the United States
in goods and services that the U.S. use as part of our economy. In essence,
anything the U.S buys that says “Made in China” is part of the U.S. economy,
and so the carbon emitted in the creation of that product belongs to the U.S.
economy as much as the carbon emitted in manufacturing a Ford Focus in Detroit.
Figure 1 represents the balance of carbon, imported CO2 from other nations to
the U.S. minus the CO2 the U.S. exports to them, as determined from the
nations’ carbon intensity. It’s clear from the figure that China contributes
by far the most CO2 to U.S. carbon emissions.

In words, Figure 1 says that the U.S. exported over a billion metric tons of CO2
to the rest of the world in 2006.

Figure 2 below illustrates data in a similar fashion, but as a percentage of
total U.S. carbon emissions:
co2percentnations-sm
Figure 2

In this case, U.S.-generated emissions as a percentage of total emissions
attributable to the U.S. economy have fallen steadily since 1985, from a high of
97.8% to 79.3%. This means that the U.S. economy has offshored 20.7% of our CO2
emissions to the rest of the world at the same time the United States has
offshored production, services, and jobs.

If the U.S. is no longer generating a significant amount of our CO2 emissions,
that means that the official carbon intensity of the Untied States (0.52 metric
tons per thousand dollars) is actually much higher. And if this is the case,
that means the reduction in carbon intensity that many people are pleased about
is at least partly an illusion. Figure 3 below illustrates how much an illusion
the regular improvements in U.S. carbon intensity actually is:
co2intensity-sm
Figure 3

Figure 3 shows an unpleasant fact - as U.S. businesses have offshored more and
more of the U.S. economy’s CO2 emissions to parts of the world where the
carbon intensity is higher but labor is cheaper, the economy’s real carbon
intensity has actually worsened since it hit it’s all-time low in 2001.

These figures illustrate a vitally important conclusion - the U.S. economy
demands a huge amount of CO2 emissions beyond it’s borders. The U.S. has
essentially offshored its GHG emission problem to the rest of the world, turning
their economies into dumping grounds for our own air pollution. Yes, they’ve
been paid well for it in U.S. dollars that helped raise the standards of living
in the affected countries. But this also means the U.S. has a responsibility to
help those countries clean their dirty energy houses.

After all, wouldn’t you want your neighbor to help rake up all the leaves he
blew from his yard into yours?

Methodology

S&R acquired the US GDP data, carbon intensity data related to energy production
and gas flaring, and U.S. imports and exports from the data repositories listed
below in sources and then performed the calculations that resulted in the graphs
above. The Excel file of these calculations is available here (zipped Excel
file) for anyone wishing to verify the calculations.

The EIA data on carbon intensity is only from the consumption of fossil fuels
and flaring of gas - it does not include agricultural emissions, for example. In
addition, the calculations are for carbon dioxide alone, excluding methane,
ozone, HCFCs and other long lived greenhouse gases.

This analysis assumes that all units of production for import and export are
equivalent in terms of CO2 emissions, while this is certainly untrue. However,
given the large variety of imports and exports, and thus a large variety of CO2
emission profiles, S&R believes that this assumption is reasonable.

The estimates of imported (and exported) CO2 are equal the carbon intensity
multiplied by the value of the imports, with the net amount of CO2 generated by
other nations on behalf of the U.S. defined as the CO2 imports minus the
exports.

Finally, all nations have data from 1992 until 2006, but only major trading
partners have data from 1985 until 2006. This produces an error in the data from
1985 to 1992. Given that over 90% of all emissions are via major trading parters
such as China and Canada, this error is believed to be relatively small.

Sources:
US GDP information (Excel file)
Energy related carbon intensity (Excel file)
Data on trade for all countries back to 1992, major trading partners back to
1985 (zipped Excel file)

Consumers Should Cut Meat/Milk Intake To Combat Climate Change

Consumers should cut meat and milk intake to combat climate change
Consumers will have to satisfy themselves with four small portions of meat and one litre of milk a week to slow down escalating climate change, a major new report has warned.
By Aislinn Simpson
Sep 2008

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3107696/Consumers-should-cut-meat-and-milk-intake-to-combat-climate-change.html

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Meat and dairy production is responsible for eight per cent of all greenhouse gas emissions, a new report suggests
The study also recommends a cut in consumption of low nutritional value foods such as alcohol, chocolate and sweets, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions caused by their production, along with a return to wartime practices of shopping on foot, buying local products and cooking in bulk.

It concedes that people are unlikely to make such changes voluntarily, and so suggests caps on greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) and carbon pricing to control what food is available at what price.

Conducted by the Food Climate Research Network, based at the University of Surrey, the four-year study is one of the most thorough of its kind.

It has been prompted by growing concern about the impact of food production and consumption on the changing global climate.

It estimates that food produced in the UK accounts for 18.5 per cent of the country's total emissions while food consumed in the UK - produced at home and abroad - accounts for 19 per cent.

Meat and dairy production alone is responsible for eight per cent of our total greenhouse gas emissions, it says, and over half of food-related emissions, followed by fruit and vegetables accounting for around 2.5 per cent of UK total emissions.

It also singles out alcohol, which is responsible for around 1.5 per cent of total emissions but contributes little in nutritional value.

"We may need to reduce consumption of such foods if we are to reduce the GHG intensity of what we consume," the report reads.

However, it concedes that this approach "raises enormous questions and accusations of nannystate misery-guts spoilsportism".

Agriculture - principally methane produced by sheep and cattle - is responsible for generating the most emissions through food production, followed by manufacturing, transport, cooking and refrigeration by consumers and packaging.

It recommends that people in the UK should cut their consumption of meat from an average of 1.6 kg (3.5lb) a week and milk from 4.2 litres (8.8 pints) a week to 500g (1lb) of meat and one litre of milk (2.1 pints).

At present, we eat an equivalent of six sausages, two chicken breasts, 100g of ham (3.5oz), eight rashers of bacon and two burgers a week, washed down with three litres of milk, 100g of cheese, and a little cream.

Under the stricter regime, we would eat one quarter-pound burger, two sausages, three rashers of bacon and one chicken breast, along with a litre of milk and 100g of cheese.

The UN has estimated that our consumption of meat and dairy products will have doubled by 2050, not only because of a growing population but because people will are expected to eat more, not less, animal-derived foods.

Tara Garnett, the report's author, said that if the UN's target of reducing carbon emissions by 80 per cent by 2050 is to be achieved, we must instead drastically change our diet, and increase production efficiency and the development of renewable fuels.

"If we don't act now, it may be too late and very much more expensive to act later," she said.